


Pretty Messed Up

by trebleDeath



Series: RoadRat [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Amputation, Angst, Asexual Character, College AU, Eating Disorders, Foster Care, Happy Ending, Highschool AU, Hurt/Comfort, If I add enough tags will I get mentioned in those ao3 tag of the day blogs?, M/M, Pain, Recreational Drug Use, Self Harm, Self-Harm, Slow Burn, Underage Drinking, almost a bad one, and characters, and writing style, are my tags scaring people, binge read material, excessive authours notes, family au, gotta warn people about that, in consistent plot, looking for validation, maybe bipolar, more to come - Freeform, no I have to be funny for that, phantom pains, then whoops I wrote ten more chapters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-30
Updated: 2016-12-26
Packaged: 2018-07-27 15:36:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 45,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7624246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trebleDeath/pseuds/trebleDeath
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What happens when the apathetic, seemingly lonely, and generally messed up kid gets befriended by the new loud kid who is also pretty messed up? Well, it IS high school, isn't everyone sort of screwed up in their own way? After all, they're all just trying to find out who they are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I do not know anything about overwatch. At all. I do not play the game, I don't watch anyone play the game. I honestly read the Wikipedia for three characters, read a couple other fanfiction so for this pairing, and got obsessed with one. Seriously, go check out Flux and that whole series, it makes me scream. 
> 
> Yeah, so, I'm writing this based on my loose interpretation (and understanding) of characters.
> 
> Also, the family au is from something I saw on tumblr. Where mercy and soldier 76 are married and have d.va. Sometimes they have junkrat. So, I was like, omg what if they mostly have d.va then sort of adopt junkrat. (He was arrested for being on the streets after running away. Which is illegal if you're min foster care. But since he hated his foster family, soldier, who's a police man in this is like, I'm taking this weird scrawny boy)

It was fair to say that Mako didn't pay much attention in class. He paid enough attention to the teacher that he could get good grades, but he sure as heck didn't pay attention to his classmates. He'd been in the same school system for years, and he still didn't know half these people's names. 

Even if he didn't put his attention anywhere but his notes or the board, he was pretty damn sure that this loud kid he was currently looking at was not here the week before. 

Mako huffed as he stared at the scrawny blond kid he had been paired with for this group project. “So, what was your name again?” He wasn't ashamed to ask, he didn't care if anyone knew he didn't care about them. 

“Jamison, call me Jamie, kay?” The boy, Jamie, hadn't really stopped smiling since they had been forced to sit together. 

“Right.” He sighed softly, “You're in my gym class as well, right?” 

“Yep, and free period.” 

Mako sighed, man, he really didn't pay attention to his surroundings. “Okay. Cool. So, which side of the debate do you want to be on?” 

“Mmmm, I don't care, what do you want to do?” 

Oh, so he was going to deflect leadership too? “I don't care. I care less than you do.”

Jamie snorted, “Nice, is this a competition or something?” 

He didn't grace that with a response.

Jamie started talking in his stead, “Okay, well, if you don't give a shit what we do more than I don't give a shit, then I'll decide. How about we go strong con. I know there's not a whole lot of material to go on, but I bet if we do individual study, we can find a lot. Yeah, this teacher is super biased, I want to stick it to her.”

He huffed again, “Spite is a stupid reason to do something.” 

“I mean, technically, everything is a stupid reason to do something. So why not spite?” 

“Fine whatever. Let's just do all of our work in class, okay? I'm not doing anything during free period or outside of school.”

Jamie scoffed, “As if, you're going to have to in order to get the info we need.” He looked up at the clock on the wall, “I mean, we only have like, ten minutes left of class and I want to get started. I mean, I don't blame you for being all nonchalant, I blame the teach for taking almost an hour to explain how modern debates work.” He slumped a little bit in his desk, resting his cheek in his hand.

Mako noticed how grimy his nails were. Gross. 

As soon as he seemed to deflate, he sprung back up. “Hey! You want to come over to my place? Well, like, I don't know if I'm allowed to have anyone over, but these foster parents seem super chill, and if not, it's not like their going to do anything while you're over.” 

Wow, um, okay. So he was a foster kid. He was really open about his life. Mako cleared his throat. “Yeah, I don't think I'm comfortable with that.” 

“Come on, it will be fun. Angela probably has baked something, and she bakes well.” 

He sighed heavily. “You know what, fine. If we can get most of this stupid thing done today, I'll go home with you.” 

If possible, Jamie's smile widened, “Cool.” 

A moment later, the bell sounded, causing the blonde to shove his notebook into a drawstring that was worn and full of crumpled loose papers. He then stood up, “Let's go, my foster sis should be waiting for at the doors.” 

Mako sighed heavily again and stood up to follow as he pulled out his phone to send a text to his mother, letting him know why he wouldn't be home soon. Because some gross fuckboi was dragging him home. He slipped his phone away and grabbed his bag to follow the lanky teen. 

Soon enough, they reached the front of the school where Jamie’s sister was allegedly waiting. 

To Mako’s surprise, Hana, one of the most popular girls in the school was the one to walk up to Jamie. 

Yeah, Mako knew who this popular, pink girl was. Even though she was only a freshman, she was a cheerleader and some sort of dance royalty or in student body office, he didn't know specifics, just that she was popular or studious enough to be mentioned constantly in the assemblies he was forced to go to. 

“Thanks for making me wait Jamison. Oh, is this your boooiifriend?” 

She seemed to have no problem talking down to Jamie though she was much shorter and two years younger. 

Jamie didn’t seem to care, “Can we go now, or are you taking home a friend again?” 

“Yeah, Lena’s coming with us today.” 

He smirked, “Oh, is she your giiirrlfriend?” 

That only made Hana blush as she scowled, “Idiot, I'm not like that.” 

“Sure.” He rolled his eyes and turned to Mako, “Sorry for being rude, this is my foster sister Hana, Hana, this is Mark.” 

Mako frowned slightly. Did he do that intentionally? “It's Mako.” 

Jamie's head immediately snapped to look at Mako, “Oh, sorry mate.” 

Hana rolled her eyes, “Kind of pathetic you don't know his name.” 

He shrugged again, “Look, there's your pal, can we get going?” 

Hana ignored him and walked over to Lena. 

While the two talked, Jamie turned to Mako. “Soooooo. Your eyebrow piercing is pretty cool.”

He didn't respond. 

“Yeah, I don't think I could handle getting a piercing. I would probably let it get infected then it would hurt like heck. I also like your hair.”

Again, no response. 

He kept talking, even as the two teenage girls lead them out of the building. “You know, sometimes I see hair like yours, and I think I should bleach my hair, but then I realize my hair is already light. I also want to buzz the sides, and do that undercut thing, but I mean, I would never be able keep up with it. You pull off that hair rather well. Makes you look punk.”

Lena looked back at that point, “Leave the poor boy alone, love, you're not going to get a response out of him. You're just going to annoy him with how much you're talking.”

Jamie sighed heavily and shoved his hands into the pockets of his cargo pants. Well, they were more like capris on him, what with how skinny and tall he was. “Not true. Everyone responds if you talk enough or give them enough time.”

Lena sighed but gave him a smile, “You can keep trying to get a full conversation out of him, but in my experience, he doesn't seem to care much,” 

He scowled, finally something different than his almost manic smile, “Well, talking about Mike like he isn't here certainly isn't going to help. Ever think that maybe apathy is a defense mechanism? Maybe none of you wankers in your fancy prep school cared so he doesn't have to care back, or maybe you were rude so he distanced himself, or maybe you should ask him why he's removed. Hmm?” 

“Um, okay Jamie. Sorry for offending you.” 

That made him scowl harder, but he backed down. He stopped glaring at her and stared at the floor. After a moment, he muttered to himself. “I'm allowed to be mad.” 

The group walked in silence for a moment. 

Only after it seemed that Jamie had relaxed some did Mako say anything. “My names Mako by the way.”

“What?” He looked over at the chubbier one, all traces of anger having melted from his face. 

“You called me Mike. It's Mako.”

“Oh, sorry mate,”

He paused, frowning, “It’s still Mako.”

“No, I’m not messing up your name this time, I swear. We’re mate’s, yeah? And even if we’re not, I’m not going to mess it up again.”

The small group fell into silence again, until, that is they walked into the Smith’s house. Well, the people who lived in the house probably didn’t have the last name Smith, but the family who lived there seemed to have the perfect American life style going on, with their nice teenage daughter, the pretty blond mom, the strict dad who worked nine to five, and a two story house with a lawn that was bordered with a pretty picket fence. 

Yeah, Mako recognized the house and the general characteristics of the people who lived there. Why? Because he lived a couple houses over. Yes. He was so stuck in his own world that he didn’t know his own neighbors. Heck, what he did know came from his parents’ gossiping. 

He was last person inside the house. And lo and behold, the blond perfect mother was indeed standing in the kitchen just past the entry way. 

She smiled gently at the teens walking in through the door. “Hello again Lena. Hana, who’s your other friend?”

Hana grabbed a couple cookies and a mountain dew from the fridge, “It’s Jamie’s friend.” After she had her snacks, she ran up the stairs, taking her friend by the hand and dragging her away as well. 

Jamie has a sort of nervous smile, “Yeah, um, this is Mako.” He looked to Mako for approval of the name. He didn't correct him so he continued. “We're working on a project for school, is that alright?” 

The woman was still smiling, “Of course! I just need to know if he needs a ride home.” 

Jamie looked to him yet again. Well, it was finally time for the chubbier one to stop having people talking for him. He cleared his throat a little bit, “Um no ma'am, I live relatively close actually. I can walk home when we're done.” 

Finally, her smile disappeared, “Hmm. I'm not sure if I like that idea. I know this is a good neighborhood and all, but I don't think you should walk home in the dark.” 

“With all due respect, I'm probably the scariest thing this neighborhood has seen and I don't think I'll be staying more than two hours.”

She gave a small sigh, “Allright, if it's still light out I'll let you walk. I'll let you boys go, but first, would, you like some cookies?” 

Jamie shook his head and started up the stairs. Mako followed, leaving behind the surely delicious sweets as he went.

The first thing he noticed when he got to the room was that it was absolutely spotless. Even the bed was made. He frowned softly. “Does your mom clean your room?” 

“Angela? No. If she cleans anyone's room, it's Hana’s and it's still a mess. I just keep this room clean, is that too hard to believe?” 

“Yes. You're dirty yourself, and you don't keep your papers in order.”

Jamie laughed at that, “Nice observation mate.” He walked over to the desk on one side of the room and turned on a computer. He also sat down on the chair, but in order to do that, he had to move a bag of spray paint to to the floor. 

That piqued Mako’s curiosity more than the clean room. “Spray paint? Why do you have that?” 

“Hmm? Oh, I'm going to go out and paint the town later tonight.” 

“Oh. You any good at art?” 

He shrugged his impossibly thin shoulders, “I'm okay at pencil art, I suck at graffiti. You know how in media you always see people just make amazing art with spray paint, without stencils, or with them even? I can't do that. I can make gang signs and smiley faces.” 

That earned a small yet deep chuckle from Mako. “I'm not any better.” 

“You vandalize shit too? You wanna come with me tonight?” 

He almost cracked a smile. Almost. “Why the hell not.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> they do graffiti then get arrested. so idk. if you're triggered. just. turn away now, it's going to get so much worse. like really, i have so much awful things planned. but I mean, this is highschool. everything is awful. 
> 
> i will put lil warnings with every chapter just in case you're okay with most things but not that one thing.

In the end, Angela made Jamie walk Mako home, and honestly, Kamie thought that was the greatest thing for a couple reasons. First, it showed that she though that he, a skinny thing was somehow stronger than Mako just because he was a couple inches taller than him at this point in time (or she just wanted him to be nice and hospitable.) Second, he would be able to see where Mako lived so that would make it easier to break him out for their late night illegal activities. Third, it was just plain cute that he was walking Mako home. It honestly made the little study session feel like a date. 

Jamie laughed at that though, effectively breaking the silence between them as they walked. He didn’t really mean to, it was just a funny thought. Him and Mako on a date. They had only know each other as anything other than classmates for two hours, and even then, they were barely anything more than classmates if Mako’s attitude was anything to go by. Plus, Jamie had a feeling that even if they did know eachother well enough to consider dating, Mako would never fall for him. 

Before he could give that much more though, Mako was speaking, “You’re laughing, what’s so funny?” 

Jamie forced his laughter to die into a chuckle, “Oh, well, you see, I was thinking. I got the thought that me walking you home was sort of like the end of a date, but that’s just plain ridiculous. You’d never fall for a fellow like me. Naw, you look punk, but you act all high class, you know?”

He grunted in response. 

Jamie gave a content hum, almost perfectly fine with walking the rest of the way in silence. Almost. He started talking again just a bit after he stopped, “Say, you’re not gay, are you?”

That actually got sort of a visible reaction from Mako. One of his eyebrows raised, “Do I look gay to you?”

“Nah, not particularly. I mean, I don’t really pay attention to stereotypes like what gay people look like. I’m just curious, because you can’t really assume what anyone’s sexuality is in this day and age, you know?”

He gave a soft grunt, “Is that a comment on social justice warriors?”

“Nah, I’m not anti-SJW. Those guys seem kind of gross, right?” He paused then cackled, “Actually, I think I’d fit right in, what with all the stereotypes. White male, cargo pants, all that. One problem, I’m gay.”

Mako raised his brow again, “Are you hitting on me?”

“I know I’m asking a lot about your sexuality and saying shit about us dating, but come on Marco-”

“Mako,”

“Sorry, Mako. I almost had it that time, and I definitely had it earlier. Anyway, give me some credit! I‘m not going to hit on every pretty boy I meet, that’s a little rude to the boys dontcha think? Plus, I already sad, you’re out of my league”

He gave a tiny nod at what Jamie was saying. 

Jamie gave a soft sigh, and resigned himself to silence again. Well, relative silence. He still hummed a bit as they walked. 

Soon enough, they stood in front of Rutledges’ house. They just stopped walking and stood, looking up at the house. Mako didn’t make a move to walk up the pathway to the front door, he just stood with Jamie, looking at the house as the sun set to their left. 

After almost half a minute, Jamie spoke up, “So, do you want me to come get you when it comes time to vandalize shit with shitty tags, or do you want to meet somewhere at a specific time?”

“Just come get me, I’ll probably fall asleep if you set a time and expect me to sneak out.”

He gave a small chuckle, “You have to sneak out? I just walk out the front door.”

Again, his eyebrow elevated itself, though this time it was joined by it’s twin. “You just tell your parents you’re off to do something illegal, then walk out the door past curfew and a bag of spray paints?”

“Yep! I told them what I was going to do yesterday. I think they think I’m joking. But I make it a habit not to lie.”

“Okay, well it doesn’t work that way in my house. I’ll have to sneak out of my house.” He raised one hand and pointed at a window, “That’s my room, just come and knock on it if you’re serious about it.” 

Yeah, Jamie was serious about it. He would scale the freaking side of the house for this. There was no way Mako was getting rid of him once he agreed to this. 

Mako took a deep breath and looked to Jamie, “Well. Bye.” He walked up to the door and entered his house. Jamie left seconds later. 

True to his words, or at least thoughts, Jamie was back at the house, knocking on Mako’s window. 

Mako opened the window, bleary eyed and scowling. This time, his scowl could be seen be everyone. “I was sleeping.” His voice, which was already pretty deep, was gravelly with sleep. 

Jamie shrugged beneath his black hoodie with a white marijuana leaf on it, which was also known as a dank weed, “I figured. Glad you woke up though. I’m also glad that this is your room and not your parents or something.”

Mako squinted at him. “What? I told you this was my room, didn’t I?”

“Well, yeah, but you could have lied. Glad you didn’t mate. Anyway, you ready to go mate?”

“Just a second, let me grab a few things.” He walked away from the window to pull his dark blue camo hoodie on over his piggy t-shirt and put on another face mask, to which, Jamie pouted. 

“Aw come on, I like seeing your full face. It’s nice. Plus, you have a nose ring, and that’s always interesting.”

Mako rolled his eyes at Jamie and walked over to the window again, his bleached hair in a ponytail again and a small drawstring bag on his back. “Where are we going?”

Jamie shrugged, “I’ve been scouting, and there are a couple popular graffiti places. You know, back of stores, warehouses and tunnels by train tracks, alleys, or that big rock off the highway. But we’d have to drive to that one. I don’t have a car or the keys to Angela’s minivan or Jack’s Honda.”

The other sighed, “Alright, well, I can’t take my parent's car either, and I don’t have something of my own yet, so local places it is.” He started to climb out the window, forcing Jamie to scoot over on the roof as well. It was only when he was on the little bit of over hang that was allowed for the first floor that he realized they had a problem. “How the fuck are we going to get down?”

“We jump.”

“You’ll die if you jump from this height.”

Jamie snorted, “Please. It’s like, thirteen feet. You’d only break something if you fell, and that’s totally different from jumping. First off, falling is straight down, jumping is an arc. Second, if I jump, I can roll when I land.”

Mako gave him an unamused stare, “Okay, smartass, not everyone does parkour.”

“Nah, I don't do parkour. I just have a lot of experience jumping off shit. Parkour is about bein’ fancy and unhurt. Jumping is going to hurt a little bit, but it’s not going to kill you unless you land on your head. Watch.” He jumped down from the roof, just. Literally jumped. He didn’t use any hand holds, he just jumped and rolled when he landed. 

Mako sighed from his position still atop the roof in front of his window. “I’m not doing that.” He walked along the roof until he reached a tree that was fairly close to the roof and climbed onto that, then climbed down. 

That tree was how Jamie got up, but using the same route to get down as up? Pffffft.

When Mako was on the floor, Jamie started walking away with him. They walked in relative silence until they reached the train tunnel that was on the side of town. Jamie managed to be quiet for all twenty minutes. 

Only then did Jamie start talking. “I hate the stupid trains that run through here. Seriously, trains are outdated and I don’t care if I’m far away from them, I can hear them, and it keeps me up.” He sighed and took out a yellow can of spray paint.

Mako shrugged and took out some pink and started drawing a pig. 

Jamie smiled when he saw it. “That’s super cute. Is it a tag?”

“It’s a pig.”

“No mate, I get that, it’s well drawn and all, but is it like, you’re calling card? Or signature?”

Mako shrugged, “I guess. Is yours?” He gestured to the yellow smiley face. 

Jamie beamed, “Yeah! I leave ‘em all over the place in every city or town I stay in. I mean, I’ve been in one rural place since I’ve started this, and I would have done it there, but everyone would have known it was me who painted on the barn.”

Mako nodded and turned back to the pig to give it eyes. “You’ve been in a lot of foster homes?” 

Jamie shrugged, he really didn’t care if people talked about his situation. Some people did. “I mean I’ve been in quite a few, everyone finds me incorrigible, violent and pretty messed up in general. So I got shuffled around, But I’ve been in a shit ton of places because I left the system at fourteen. You know? Got hired by local businesses, begged, went from one town to the next every couple of months before people caught on. But I got caught in this stupid town and now I’m stuck here.”

“So you’ve been tagging towns for two years?”  
He nodded, “Sounds like a lot, but it’s only like twelve or so towns and cities.”

Mako mirrored his nod, “So, do you tag all over the city or just one place?”

“I try to tag all over. This is my first time tagging this place.” He took out a black paint marker and outlined his yellow and white smiley. The last detail he added was x’s through the wide, uneven eyes. 

Mako shook his head when Jamie offered him the ped. His pig already had black details that were evidentually painted with the black spray paint can in his hands. 

He smiled. “Nice. That’s a nice piece of graffito.”

“What?”

“Graffito is the singular of graffiti.”

Mako grunted. “What should we do now? Go to another location?”

Jamie shook his head. “We should paint dicks on the arty stuff. Like, graffiti is all about anarchy and expressing yourself in a thug kind of way, but all these hipsters are making stencils and all these bad ass art. Like yeah, they need to express themselves too, and they might be all about anarchy. But seriously, they're trying to make graffiti a rich, talented man’s game. Seriously, just let us have our teenage rebellion without trying to make a huge movement.”

Mako frowned, “I’m all for tearing down pretentious people, but, I don’t think that you should destroy someone else’s art.”

Jamie shrugged, “They need to defend it. You have to revisit these places, retag them, re paint them with your art, pain over who ever took your tag’s place. It’s just street life mate.”

“Let’s not paint on their things anyway. I’m pretty sure my friend Amelia is one of the stencil artists.”

Jamie nodded. “Okay fine. Can we at least draw penises near them, preferably ejaculating towards the arty shit?”

He rolled his dark brown eyes, “Don’t say ejaculating, you sound like a doctor. But fine.”

His face lit up once again, “Great! Toss me your pink!”

Mako rolled his eyes again with a heavy sigh but gave him the pink, ashamed the piggy pink that he used for all his cute little pigs would be used for this shit. 

Jamie managed to get on genital drawn before someone else was in the tunnel. “Police, freeze.” and indeed, there was a police officer, who looked irritated rather than threatening. 

Mako’s eyes went wide as he silently looked to Jamie, who just swore violently. 

The man walked forward and dragged out some cuffs. He looked pointedly at Mako, “You need a ride home, son? I’m just after this one.” He pointed at Jamie with his chin. 

Mako shook his head, “I’m fine sir, I can get home on my own. Thank you though.”

“Nonsense, let me give you a ride.” He lead Mako to the police car he arrived in and shoved Jamie in the back, but not before he pat him down, which lead to the confiscation of a pocket knife. 

The officer silently drove Mako home with very little promptings from Mako himself. After he was dropped off, the officer probably drove Jamie to the police station. 

Well. He’d have to touch base with him later.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a fight in this one. Then a little blood, not too graphic. Idk. We start to get into the darker themes. Next time, we just dive the f-bomb into them. So yeah.

The next time Mako saw Jamie was the next day during second period when they were both getting dressed for P.E. Correction, Jamie was getting dressed for P.E., Mako was putting his school bag in the locker room and avoiding showing anyone in the room any part of his body than his hands and parts of his face. He would only change into the school issued gym clothes if his gym grade was bad. 

Turns out, the teacher didn’t care. He’d scold him then dock his grade once every few weeks. It was then that Mako got changed in one of the bathroom stalls, then everything was just peachy. 

Point being, Jamie was taking off his pink ‘Nothing says I love you like fisting’ t-shirt and Mako couldn’t help but stare a tiny bit. Not like, in a pervy way, more like fascinated. The kid was just so skinny, and he was covered in scars, some looked self inflicted and some looked like they came from knife fights or just jumping from roofs and not landing right. But that was just speculation. 

Mako forced his gaze away from the tall boy and made his way out of the locker rooms to the gym. He would have stopped to talk to him, but it was common courtesy to not talk to people while they were half naked in a public environment. 

He waited in the gym for Jamie to step out of the locker room. After a few minutes he did, and honestly the way he look almost made Mako want to laugh. He looked like he was downing in the t-shirt that the school’s crest on it, and he must have gotten the girl’s shorts, because the gold fabric was barely peeking out from the long hem of his shirt. 

God, had Mako really not noticed this punk before?

He walked up to the teen, “Hey, what happened last night?”

“Oh, hey Mako.” Jamie gave him a smile before continuing, “You’re talking about the whole arrest thing, right?”

He gave a small nod. 

Jamie took that as a cue to continue, though he probably would have continued had Mako not done anything. “Oh, well, that was my foster father. He’s a cop, and he’s a bitch.” He gave a tiny shrug, “He’s just really adamant about his ‘children’,” he used honest to god air quotes, “behaving and following laws. It’s bullshit. Anyway, apparently when he found out that I wasn’t in my room reading the bible or whatever kids are supposed to do nowadays, he realized I was being honest about saying I was going to go vandalize shit. He arrested me to teach me a lesson. I just got pat down and stuck in holding for like two hours. It’s not that big of a deal.”

He huffed, “You sound like you’re and old man when you say, ‘what kids are supposed to do nowadays.’”   
That only made Jamie smile more for some reason, “Why thank you Mako, I do pride myself in being full of shit just like old people.”

“Yeah, whatever. Tell your foster dad he scared the shit out of me.”

Amelia came over and rested her arm on Mako’s shoulder as if she were as tall or taller than him even though she was shorter. “What scared the shit out of you Mako?” She eyed jamie as if this were the first time she had seen him as well. “Don’t tell me you’re scared by this tiny string bean.”

Jamie chuckled and stood up straight, “I’m taller than the both of you!”

True, he was taller than Mako by a few inches, but he wasn’t done growing yet, he’d have a growth spurt soon and leave Jamie in his shadow. 

Amelia just rolled her eyes at Jamie, “Whatever Jamison.” So she did know him. “Tell me Mako, what's gotten you scared?”

He gave an almost inaudible sigh. “Jamie almost got me arrested last night for vandalizing crap.” 

Amelia snorted, “You're scared of the fuzz?” 

He sighed again, this time louder, “We can talk about being rebellious all we want, but when someone with martial arts training, a gun, and a business attitude shows up, you don't want to really be there. We're teenage punks, not real criminals, no matter how edgy you think you are,” 

Jamie's eyes were wide as he beamed, “That's the longest I've heard you speak!” Like that was an accomplishment. 

Amelia chuckled, “Yeah, Ruty here doesn't talk to anyone who isn't worth his time. And as for you,” she shifted her cold, almost indifferent gaze from Jamie back to Mako, “I may not be a hardened criminal, but I sure as hell am scarier than this twig here.” She gestured with a manicured hand to Jamie. 

“Hey, I'm pretty damn scary. I mean, I got arrested.” 

It was mako’s turn to jump in, “But that was just your dad teaching you a lesson.” 

He sighed, “True. But I bet that I could beat either of you in a fight; I have more street experience than either of you.” 

Mako rolled his eyes, “I'm not going to be goaded into a fight. I'm leaving.” He walked away from them. 

He leaned against the wall once he reached it and looked back to the pair he had left just in time to see Amelia deck Jamie. 

Jamie reeled and fought back, still grinning manically. 

Other kids looked on with disinterest, some even started cheering them on, but no one broke them apart. 

When the gym teacher walked in, he pulled them apart then walked them to the principal's office.

The next time Mako saw Jamie was during free period. By then, he had changed out of his gym clothes and back into his cut off shorts and had developed a nice bruise on the side of his face, and he was still grinning. He threw himself into the chair next to Mako, which was totally allowed seeing as it was free seating. 

Mako raised a brow at him. “Nice bruise.” 

“Thanks. That girlfriend of yours got a nice split lip.” 

He frowned, “She's not my girlfriend.” 

“Aw, but she's pretty, and can pack a punch. What more do you want in a girl?” 

He shrugged and turned to his homework. He was done with that conversation. 

Jamie seemed to be okay with that, he would carry on the conversation himself. “I actually know the answer to that. Boobs. There's this cute girl, Mei, in my chemistry class. Smart, and has a nice rack, like damn.” 

Mako looked up from his work, irritated, “Can you stop talking about girls like that? And I thought you were gay.” 

“Yep, I am still super gay. I like boys a lot more than I like girls, but I still find a few ladies I like. And I'm just trying to talk about something relatable. I mean, I'm willing to bet you'd like it even less if I talked about all the hot boys I've seen.”

“How about you not talk about romance? I'm trying to do homework anyway.” 

“Oh?” Jamie leaned over and looked at the papers in front of Mako. “Oh, so you have Ms. Bullif for chemistry too? Nice. I already finished that worksheet.” 

“How the hell did you do that? This is impossible, and she's an awful teacher.” 

“Kay, well first, I completely ignore her.” He took the others pencil, pausing to smile at the little pig erasure that hadn't been used. “Second, I use my knowledge of chemistry and the textbook which is actually a damn good teacher. Like, this one.” He pointed to one equation, “The hydrogen would be isolated from everything but the oxygen. We know that because it bubbled, but those hydrogen have a strong bond to that oxygen.” 

He started scribbling things down as he talked. Mako nodded as he went, understanding about seventy percent of it. 

At the end of the period, Jamie got his stuff and walked out. For some reason, Mako found that odd. He honestly expected the boy to stick by his side and walk with him to the lunch room, sit with him, then walk with him to their world civ class. Or maybe he just wanted him to. 

He sighed and went to the lunchroom to find Amelia and Gabriel. After he sat down with them, he noticed Jamie a couple tables away with a Mt. Dew and scribbling something in a notebook, probably last minute homework. 

Mako turned his attention away and ignored the blonde for the rest of the half hour lunch period. 

When lunch was over, he walked to his last class and sat down.

Jamie was quite late, late enough that everyone else had already started working. He strutted over and sat down on top of Mako’s desk. “So, any new instruction for today?” 

“Nope. Get off my desk.” 

He slid off the desk and sat down in the empty one next to him. “Are you honestly working on this stuff? We have like a week, and thanks to yesterday, almost all of our information.”

“We still need to write arguments, practice and revise them.” 

He groaned, “I don't want to.” He flopped his head onto the desk and didn't lift it up until the end of class, finally letting Mako work in peace. 

Once the bell rang, he stood up. “Hey, do you want to walk home with my sister and me, then go to the park? Hana wants me to drive her and her friends to the park, and I don't want to be alone.” 

“She's like fourteen isn't she?” Mako grabbed his own bag. “Why does she need to go to the park?” 

He looked him straight in the eye, “Pokemon.”

Mako sighed, “Damn app. Who would have thought it survived more than a week. But sure, I'll go with you, I don't have anything else to do.” 

Yeah he did! He could go home and do nothing, that was better than going to a public space with his peer group. But he agreed. 

He walked out of the classroom with Jamie again to meet up with Hana, along with quite a few others. They walked to the same house they did before, this time though, the group was chatting the entire time. That's what having five other teenagers there entailed. 

Once they got to the house, Jamie slipped inside to grab the keys to the mini van. What should have taken two seconds took nearly five minutes. 

Finally he came back out and announced to the group, “Sorry, Angela forced first aid on me. And she scolded me. But I got the keys.” He dangled them as if no one believed him. 

They all piled into the car and drove the park. When they got there, Jamie took off running for the swings. Nice. Just leave Mako all alone with preppy teenagers. Nice, Jamie, so. Nice. 

At least Hana stayed with him and talked with him. Meanwhile, Jamie was screaming from the swings. Just things like “Hey Mako look at me! I'm so high! I bet I can swing without holding to the chains!” 

All at once, the pleas for attention stopped. Somewhat curious, Mako looked over. Jamie was on his hands and knees, with blood dripping off his face. 

He stood up, sort of shakily, and walked over to a bench on the side of the playground and wrapped his arms around his middle as he slouched. 

Mako walked over to him with a small frown, “What happened?” 

He looked up with his light brown eyes, looking sort of mad, “I fell off the fucking swing.” 

He was silent for a second. “How?” 

“I let go of the chains, the swing went backwards, I didn't, I went straight down and landed in my face.” He sucked in a breath through his teeth and winced, “Fuck, I want to go home.” 

“Doesn't look much worse than what you got this morning from the fight, and you were grinning then.” 

“Yeah, well fights are fun and I was prepared for fun.” He really did sound irritated. 

“Still, a bloody nose doesn't seem that much worse than being punched.” 

“I have a bloody nose?” He reached a hand up and winced again when he found it red. With a soft sigh, he pulled his shirt off and held it to his nose. It was already stained with blood, and probably for the best.

Once again, Mako could see his bare chest. He sort of expected at least some muscle definition,but aside from some faint an lines, there was nothing but ribs. But he had to admit, it was still sort of sexy. 

Jamie stood up and dug out keys from his pocket. “Yeah, I'm going home,” he walked a little bit, “Hana! I want to leave!” 

The younger girl looked over from her group of friends. Apparently, in the time since Mako left them, they found someone’s puppy, and the owner allowed Hana to hold it. 

Instead of putting the small dog down and walking over, Hana yelled back, “What! We just got here!”

He groaned. “Well then I'm going to sit in the car and listen to metal. And you can't stop me!” 

She huffed. “You're going to waste the battery or polite the air.” 

“Yeah. So get in the car or let me be.” Jamie started towards the white mini van, accenting his choice by flipping off Hana as he went. 

Hana sighed heavily and headed towards the car as well, dragging her friends as she did.

Seeing as they were all heading over, Jamie tossed the keys to Mako, “You can drive, right?” 

He nodded, “Why can't you drive?” 

“I don't want to get blood everywhere. I mostly want to lie in the passenger seat and listen to metal.” 

They all got into the car, most of the other cool teens complaining about being at the park for a short twenty minutes. 

Jamie ignored them and curled up in the passenger seat after playing some band called ‘Equilibrium’ to which everyone complained.

Other than everyone being in a sour mood, the ride went pretty well. Mako dropped everyone off at the house and decided to follow Jamie inside. It was the right thing to do, right? Besides, he still had the keys.

He walked in the front door to see everyone but the tall lanky blond slip into the kitchen. 

Angela, the same path woman who offered him cookies the other day, was tilting Jamie’s face up to look at his face. “Well. It doesn't look broken. How did this even happen, did you get in another fight?”

“No, I fell off a swing.” He pulled away from her touch, “I'm going upstairs, I won't get blood on anything.” He glanced at Mako before turning and walking up the stairs. Well, he jogged up the stairs. 

Mako cleared his throat, “I brought your keys back.” 

The woman turned to Mako, “Thank you! And sorry about Jamison, he gets upset easily, don't take it personally.” With a smile, she took the keys. “He’ll be fine tomorrow.” 

Honestly, he didn't need to know that, but it was sort of nice to know she thought he cared. He muttered a thank you before leaving and walking home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm honestly basing so much of this off of my life, I fell off a swing. And I listen to equilibrium, which is a German folk metal band. Listen to their song, blut im auge,


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bruh. idk if you've noticed, but I'm trying to switch the pov every chapter from mako to jamie, but it's not working. it always goes to mako. mako, ur too strong. 
> 
> anyway, this chapter is all 'feels' idk. idk how to write feels. there's mentions of self harm in this. idk. idkdkdk. just. idk. thats my life, i just don't know. someone help me.

Jamie took a breath and steeled himself as well as his nerves before knocking on the glass in front of him. It was the second time in twenty four hours he was going to be knocking on the same window. But whatever. YOLO. 

He knocked on the cold glass and waited. 

It took a while, but Mako eventually answered, opening the window completely shirtless with his bleached hair down and frowning at whoever woke him. 

Jamie offered him a small smile, “Hey Mako, lovely night isn’t it?”

He wasn’t having any of that shit. “What the hell are you doing on my roof again?”

“Oh you know, I just thought that it was such a great night, and I had to share it with someone via Romeo and Juliet balcony scene recitation.”

Mako blinked slowly. “Wouldn’t I have to be the one calling you in order for this to be a real Romeo and Juliet scene, since I’m the one in the house. And that would make me Juliet.”

“Okay, maybe my plans have a few flaws in them. That doesn’t mean we don’t have to enjoy some good ol’ fashioned Shakespeare.”

“It’s the middle of the night, and I really doubt you came here to talk to me about some old dead playwright.”

Jamie pouted, “Okay fine, I didn’t. I can’t sleep, and I thought that it would be a good idea to come over here.”

He paused, “So let me get this right. We’ve known each other for like, two days. And yo think it’s fine for you to come over to my house in the middle of the night?”

“Aw come on mate, when you say it like that, it makes me sound clingy and like I don’t understand social cues. I mean, I am and I don’t but come on. Throw me a bone, I ain’t got no where else to go, and it’s cold out here on your roof.”

“It’s not that cold, it’s only October. And you can go home.”

Jamie gave a dramatic sigh, “Come on Mako, let me in. Please? I’ll only stay for like an hour. But I’m boooreeeddd.”

“Well there’s nothing for you to do here, I want to sleep.”

“We could play twenty questions or some other game.”

Mako groaned but stepped away from the window, “Fine.”

Jamie smiled as he climbed into the room. “Thanks mate.”

“Yeah whatever. You wouldn’t have left, and I don’t think I could have gone to sleep with you on my roof staring in all pathetic like.”

He chuckled, “You’re right, I wouldn’t have left.” He walked over to the side of the room where there was a cage filled with wood chip bedding. “What’s in here?” 

Mako walked over, “That’s your first question. And it’s a guinea pig." He moved the little house in the corner and scooped up a large rodent. 

“Aw sweet, we’re actually playing? What’s his name?”

Mako couldn’t help but crack a smile, “I get to ask a question before I answer those. But yeah, we’re playing; there’s not much else to do.”

Jamie smiled, and reached down a hand to let the cavy sniff his hand. “Okay, then it’s your turn to ask a question.”

“All right, would you like to hold him?”

“I mean I would, but I think I’d drop him, so I’ll just pet him.” He moved his hand to pet the pig with one finger. “What’s this li’l guys name?”

“He’s actually pretty big for a guinea pig. I just call him pig, but his official name is Momo.”

Jamie nodded and continued to pet the little brown fuzz ball. “Your turn again,”

Mako smiled then put him back in his cage. “Fuck, I don't know. What’s your favorite color?”

He shrugged, “Never given it much thought. Probably orange or yellow. When did you get your nipples pierced?”

Mako looked down, apparently having forgotten he wasn’t wearing a shirt, or a face mask for that matter. He sighed, “Like, last year. God, no one has seen these but Amelia and Gabe.”

“You’re pretty self conscious right? And before you get on my case, that’s a rhetorical question. You just seem really self conscious, what with your attitude and what you wear. So, if you don’t want to be noticed, why do you get piercings and dye your hair and all that?”

“That is a legit question, and it’s not your turn.”

Jamie pouted, “Fine, hurry up and ask me a question.”

“Well, if you’re going to ask me something personal, then, how did you get all those scars on your body.”

“Oh these?” He pulled off his shirt, once again revealing his pale chest. Yes, he really did have a thing for taking off his shirts. “I got this one from climbing a barbed wire fence, these from getting into a knife fight, this one from falling into a bunch of glass bottles. These two, believe it or not, came from someone’s nails when they scratched me. This one’s from a cat. And the rest, well I think you get it.” He gave an uncertain smile, gosh, he was just all smiles and pouts. “So, why do you do body modification if you’re self conscious?”

Mako sighed, “I’m not that self conscious. I want to look how I want, and I don’t care what people think about how I look, but I don’t want them to look at me.”

Jamie nodded, “I think I get it.”

“Good. So.... you self harm?” Wow. Just wow, right there Mako. Going for the elephant in the room. Nice. 

Jamie drew his shoulders in, his shirt back on his body at that point, “Yeah, well, I mean I did. I haven’t in a couple years. You cut yourself too, why do you do it?”

Right. Mako wasn’t wearing a shirt. Or a hoodie. He was beginning to regret this. “It’s not like I like pain. I just need an outlet for anger and other emotions. Why don’t you do it anymore?”

“Well, I mean, there are enough people in the world that are going to hurt you, not to mention life itself, so I figured, I shouldn’t add to the pain I’m going to experience in life.” He gave a soft shrug, “Do you want to move to a different topic?”

“Yeah,” 

Jamie grinned and started to laugh at that. “Nice. Let’s head somewhere lighter. You’re turn.”

Mako couldn’t help but crack a smirk at his laughter. “Okay, if you had to get a tattoo somewhere, what would you get?”

“I think I would get a flaming skull or that smiley face tag on, like my arm. I like to think I’m emo punk as shit. What would you get.”

“Hey, that’s stealing my question.”

“It’s not against the rules, now answer.”

“Fine. I’d get a pig on my stomach, but like, on fire.”

He smirked, “Yeah, got to keep up your punk reputation. But you like pigs, dontcha?” Jamie looked around him once again, as if to reassure himself that yes, this room was indeed covered in pigs. It was honestly super cute. 

“Yep.” Mako yawned and moved to sit on his bed. “I’m honestly out of questions. What’s your favorite ice cream flavor?”

“Chocolate.” Jamie sat on the floor, “What’s your favorite book?”

“The Thin Executioner. Are you going to get arrested again for coming here in the middle of the night?”

“I don't think so, I mean, I’ll be back soon. I said I’d only be here for an hour. Do you want to make out?”

That question grabbed Mako’s attention immediately. “What?”

“It’s still my turn until you answer.” Jamie answered without skipping a beat.

“My answer is what the hell are you talking about? I don’t think I heard you right.”

He got up and sat next to Mako, about half a foot away. “I said, do you want to make out?”

“Um no? What the hell brought this on?”

Jamie shrugged, “I don't know. You’re good looking and I want to.”

“Don’t say that. I’m tired of those games.”

He huffed, “It’s not a joke, I like your face, it’s ruggedly handsome. But whatever, I won’t call you anything like that.” He stood up off the bed, “Well, I think my hour of wasting your time is about up. I’ll get going.”

Mako nodded, “See you around.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> god. i'm so angsty. i want to make this a slow burn, but i also want to make a lot of things happen. bklug. i'll write a filler chapter, then some sad. then some more sad. then gay then sad gay then idk. 
> 
> seriously. someone help me, i am a seventeen year old messup, but i am being forced to be an adult. i went grocery shopping today. i budget. i have a car, and it's not fun, i jsut drive my sisters around on errands. i cook healthy dinners. and i have no time to do anything. help me pls.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> implied drug use. like so heavily implied that I'm pretty sure i said they have marijuana. whatever.

Mako did see Jamie around a lot. The skinny blond seemed to manage to squeeze his way into every aspect of his life. 

Once Amelia heard about him hating arty people taking over the graffiti field, she dragged him out with the group on their regular vandalizing adventures and made him watch her create stunning art of a girl being eaten by a giant spider. Yeah, Amelia was always drawing creepy stuff like that. And now she was forcing Jamie, the boy who had split her lip at the beginning of the month, to watch her paint these things with stencils she made and spray paint.

That lead to Gabriel inviting him to sit with them at lunch, so he did. He participated in conversations, and smiled like he usually did, but he was always scribbling in his notebook. Only during lunch did he ever bring out that notebook, which upon closer inspection, Mako identified as a sketchbook. 

He didn’t think to ask about it until it was almost mid november and the both of them were lying on the floor of Mako’s room, somewhere between high and sober with the smell of marijuana lingering in the air. Not that it mattered, both Mako’s parents worked full time, which let him do whatever he wanted. 

And what he wanted to do right then was get high with Jamie. Well, not really, Jamie was the one who bought the weed and brought it over to Mako’s house. They couldn’t smoke it over at Jamie’s place, not with a police officer and nice christian woman there. 

So, there they were, lying on Mako’s bedroom floor, almost high, and giggly. That’s when Mako asked about the sketch book. 

He reached a hand out to tap Jamie, “Hey, you know that sketchbook you always draw in during lunch? What’s that about? What do you draw?”

Jamie sat up, propping his skinny self up with his arms. With a lopsided grin, he spoke, “Wanna see?” Without waiting for much of an answer, he got up and grabbed his sketchbook from his drawstring bag that was discarded against one side of the bed. Once he had, it, he walked back over to Mako and sat down cross legged. 

Mako sat up himself to look at it. He opened the book and started flipping through the pages. Each one was filled with little sketches of people’s faces. Angela’s smile, Jack’s disapproving glance, Hana’s bubbly laugh, they all seemed to be captured in rough lines. By no means were these pictures professional or done, but they did manage to capture emotion pretty well. 

Mako let himself smile, just a little bit, knowing Jamie could see it considering he had taken off his medical mask. “These are nice.”

Jamie beamed, “Thanks. I just doodle when I’m anxious or whatever. Angela suggested it. It’s fun to see the collection grow.” He took the book back, "Wanna see my favorite picture?” He started flipping, again, not really waiting for an answer. 

Mako let him, not really minding. 

After a few moments, he thrust the sketchbook into the other's large hands. The page Jamie had flipped to was filled with sketches of him, Mako. Some looked more polished and refined than others. And like all the other pages, there was a date in the corner. The day after Jamie dragged Mako out to go tag the train tunnel.

A little in awe, he raised a hand and began tracing the lines on the page. 

The blond across from him started to speak again, “Yeah, I had to draw those from memory, since that was the first time I had seen you without your mask. I mean, I’ve sketched you before, but I really like these. They really capture your beauty.” He moved to sit next to Mako. He pressed close to im and pointed to some of the drawings. “I got some things wrong since I usually sketch with a legit model in front of me.”

Mako looked up at him, not minding the closeness at all.”You’ve drawn me before?”

“Sure. I mean, this was before we talked.” He took the sketch book again and flipped to the first few pages. “I draw interesting people I see in class. Mostly I draw people I know, because then the emotion is there, but you looked so nice I had to draw you.” He flipped through the book and showed him a couple pages with his visage on it. Him sitting in class looking bored, him standing, shoulders hunched, just a few small sketches, but still nice. 

“Jamie, these are really nice. I mean, they look a whole lot better than any pictures I’ve seen of myself.”

“Yeah, that’s because they’re candid and I can take liberties.” Jamie leaned his head on Mako’s shoulder, “You’re fun to draw, you know that, right?”

He snorted, “No, why would I know that?”

Jamie shrugged, “I don’t know. Just like, instinct maybe?” 

He snorted again, this time letting it turn into a full on laugh. 

The other started laughing too. 

They calmed down, letting the laughter die off. 

Jamie switched positions again so that he was kneeling in front of Mako, pressing their foreheads together. “You really are gorgeous, you know that right?”

“I mean, you always say shit like that, and I wish you didn’t.”

“Mako, I’m not kidding. You’re amazing, and I love your face, and maybe.” He trailed off. He was silent for a moment before he leaned in and kissed the now taller one. 

Mako pulled away almost immediately, “Jamison, what the hell are you doing?”

Jamie pouted, “Trying to kiss you, I’m not succeeding though.”

“Yeah, but why are you doing that?”

He shrugged, “It felt right, I mean you were blushing, and I was feeling it. I didn’t want to stop to ask, because last time you said no.”

“Maybe I said no for a reason. Maybe I’m not gay, maybe I’m just not interested in you. I mean, you said it yourself, you didn’t think that I’d fall for you.” The blush Jamie was talking about still stained Mako’s face, he could feel it clearly now. 

Jamie sighed, “Well, then I’ve just made everything awkward.” He stood up, “No hard feelings mate?” He offered a hand. 

Mako gave him a look of uncertainty before taking it and pulling himself up. “Yeah.”

Jamie gave a tiny smile, “Great. I’m hungry, I’m going to go make ramen, want some?”

“Sure.” 

They ended the evening in the kitchen eating ramen and drinking green tea like true weaboos.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i got ice cream. i'm over my existentialism. i still don't know what i'm doing.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hana and Jamie throw a party that has alcohol, and mako catches a case of the gays from the slutty Catholic boy that is Jamie, who might not even be Catholic.
> 
> Just FYI guys, I will never use chapter summary, and I live off of comments. So. Leave me something nice to encourage me? Please? I will love you.

Jamie sat on Hana’s bed, his right hand currently in her lap being painted with dark grey. “Okay, you can do little designs, right?” 

“Yeah, you got something in mind?” Her tongue poked out of her mouth as she worked. 

“Yep! I want flames on my nails, but the thumb should be a smiley face, but like with exed out eyes. I'll draw you a picture of what I want when these dry.” 

She nodded and went back to work in silence. Well, not really silence since Hana had her playlist, which mainly consisted of the Halo official sound track and Korean boy bands, playing in the background.

Still, Jamie felt the urge to start up the conversation a lot. “So, are there any boys you like, or girls? I don't judge.” 

She sighed, “Everyone cool is older than me, so I don't feel it's right to have a crush on any of them.” 

“I'm sure there are cool people your age.” 

“I mean, I guess. But the people I hang out are all like, a year or two older than me. And if I do have feelings for them, and I'm not saying I do, they would never return those feelings. So, I mean, what's the point of having a crush?” 

Jamie shrugged, which earned him a glare from Hana. “Having a crush is just natural. And I guess it gives you sort of a goal, you know, to woo them, even if myou think its impossible. Like take me and Mako--” 

The younger interrupted him, “I knew you liked him!” 

“Yeah, now shut up, I'm talking. I know that Mako doesn't like me, and he's probably not going to fall for me considering his tastes, but I'm not going to stop because I don't have anyone else to pine after.” 

Hana nodded and took out her yellow and orange to start doing the flames. “Okay, but you'll be hurt when it's not required.” 

“I'll get over it.” 

As he spoke, Ana stuck her head into the room. The old woman was watching the two teenagers for the night since Jack and Angela didn't really trust either of them not to blow something up. Ana, on the other hand, seemed to trust them. “The two of you are just going to paint your nails right?” 

They nodded. 

She nodded in return, “Great. I'm probably going to go nap or watch the news.” She left the two of them alone. 

Hana smiled, “That means she's going to get drunk and we can do whatever we want.” 

Jamie smirked, “I got some fireworks. Wanna make some alcoholic drinks and invite some people over to blow shit up while drunk.” 

“I was thinking just getting drunk ourselves, but sure, let's invite people. Can't have it too big though.” 

He nodded, “I'll only invite three people, you invite whoever.” He already was leaning away from Hana to grab his phone, which in turn, caused her to mess up one of the nails she was working on. 

She huffed, “I'm not fixing that.” 

“Whatever, it looks great.” He started texting Amelia, Gabriel and Mako with his free hand. Just a simple text asking if they'd be up for a semi illegal get together in a few hours. 

Mako replied immediately, “I'm up for that. Can I bring someone?” 

Jamie texted back, “Ye. don't see why not, m8. Who is it? :0c” 

“Zarya.”

Gabriel decided to join the group chat at that time. “Oooooh, is that the girl you've been seeing? Are we finally going to meet her? Ooooooooooooooooooooh!” 

Then a moment later he texted again, “Yeah Jamie, I can make it.” 

Mako responded, “Yes. Zarya is the girl I have been on a few dates with.” 

Jamie frowned and looked to Hana, “Mako has a girlfriend?” 

Hana shrugged, “Maybe. If he does, let me say this now.” She placed a gentle hand on his knee, “That's rough buddy.” 

He sighed and looked back at the phone when it buzzed again, this time with Amelia’s response. “I'll make it. Only to show off MY girlfriend and meet Mako’s. Btw Fawkes, I'm bringing a girl too.” 

He sighed once more and texted them all back, “Yeah, that’s fine. See you later tonight.” 

Jamie put his phone down and looked to Hana who was now pouting, “What's up?” 

“All my friends can make it except Lena, she's apparently already going to a party with her girlfriend. Like honestly, blowing me off for some emo chick, rude. Whatever, we can have fun without her.” 

“Yeah, sure we can.” He gave her an encouraging smile, and let her get back to painting his nails. 

 

An hour later, the two teenagers were setting everything up, which meant hooking up Hana’s phone to the speakers and blaring her pop punk playlist. Then cracking glow sticks and making alcoholic milkshakes--Hana’s idea since she insisted vodka tasted nasty and ice cream was always cool. She also made sure they made nonalcoholic milkshakes as well. The difference between the two was marked with a festive umbrella in the alcoholic ones. 

Through the whole setting up phase, Ana never woke up, even with music playing fairly loud in the backyard. 

Once it was sufficiently dark, people started showing up. 

Gabe walked up to Jamie, “Yo. So, what's the illegal part of this?” 

Jamie jabbed a thumb towards the drinks. “We have alcohol.” 

He nodded, “Cool. Aren't your parents going to notice that some of their stash is missing?” 

“Nah, I bought it myself. Turns out when you're freakishly tall, most cashiers assume you're legal.” He snorted, “Or they just don’t give a fuck.” 

He nodded again, “Well, that's a good thing to keep in mind, I can use you to get cigs or booze. I'm going to go get drunk right now though. See you in a minute.” 

Jamie also saw Amelia walk into the backyard, her arm wrapped around Lena’s waist. Once Hana caught sight of that, she gasped almost comically and walked over to the two.

Finally, Mako arrived, holding hands with a girl with short, bright pink hair. 

Jamie walked over to them, hands shoved into the pockets of his marijuana hoodie, “Hiya, you must be Zarya, right?” 

She nodded with a grin. “Yes, and you’re either Jamie or Gabriel.” 

He grinned despite his emotions, she was friendly enough. “Yel, I'm Jamie. Nice to meet you. Well, I think everyone is here, and it's dark enough, so let's go blow some shit up, yeah?” 

Zarya giggled, “Sure, that sounds like fun.” 

Mako nodded, agreeing with her. 

Jamie jogged back to the middle of the lawn where some aerials were already set up. Without announcing it, he lit the fuse. 

Moments later, the small crowd that had gathered in the backyard was startled by the loud noise, then placated by the bright lights. 

Gabriel walked over to Jamie, sort of really drunk. “Give me the lighter, I wanna light one.” 

The blond shrugged and handed him the lighter. They were already set in place, so he wouldn't light anything on fire. 

Gabe giggled as the firework he lit up exploded into colors. 

Jamie pat his shoulder and took the lighter back. He was honestly having such a good time blowing shit up. 

Soon, he was laughing with the rest of them in the darkness. He could only see the glow bracelets on people's wrists until one of the fireworks went off, then everyone's drunk, happy faces lit up.

He also saw something else;Mako slip away from Zarya and go inside away from the noise. 

Curious, Jamie handed the lighter to Lucio, who honestly looked the least drunk. With that taken care of, he slipped inside to find Mako. 

He found the other teenager sitting against the wall in the hall with…. Teary eyes? 

Jamie frowned and sat besides him. Softly, he spoke, “Hey, what's up?” 

Mako took a breath and raised a hand to wipe at his eyes. “Nothing.” 

“Okay,” he fell silent for a beat, but quickly took up speaking again. “Do you want to talk about it?” 

The other sighed, “My guinea pig died. I mean, he was old, I had him for five years. I knew this was coming, but I didn't want it to happen. And I didn't want to be texted about it.” He let his hand drop to his side. “God, I don't know why I'm getting so upset.” 

Jamie pressed closer to his side. “You loved him, and he's not going to be a part of your life anymore, that's a perfectly valid reason to be upset.” 

He let out a shaky breath. “I guess. But I knew this was coming. I shouldn't cry.”

“Even if you knew it was coming, it's still going to hurt. And it's normal to cry.” 

Mako was silent for a second. “I feel weak.” 

“That's a side effect of being sad.” He rested his head in the other’s shoulder, “I don't know how to make that go away. I mean, I can offer you ice cream or vodka. Those both seem to cheer people up.” 

He shook his head. 

Jamie nodded, “Okay, then we can just sit in here until you feel better.” He went silent again and slowly move his hand to hold Mako’s. 

Surprisingly, the now taller one let him.

The two sat there until everyone else came into the house, claiming it was too cold outside to continue. Which meant Jamie had to go outside and clean everything up, not that he was complaining, after all, Mako agreed to help. 

 

Jamie paced the stretch of sidewalk in front of the Rutledge residence on a Sunday afternoon, just a couple days after the little late night get together. A small cardboard box with holes in it sat a few feet away from him. 

After two whole minutes of pacing, he stopped and took out his phone to text Mako. “Hey. Um. I sort of did something stupid. Want to help me?” 

Mako texted back a short minute later. “-_- what did you do now?” 

“I don't know if I can explain it with words. Come here.” 

This time he responded immediately. “where are you?”

“Just outside your house. Oops. :/” 

That time, there was no response. But Mako did show his face a minute later as he walked out of his house. He really didn't look amused. That much was painfully clear due to the absence of his mask. 

Jamie gave him a smile once the taller stood in front of him. “Hey mate, how's it going?” 

“What did you do?” Mako was apparently having none of it. 

“Oh, right!” He moved over to the small cardboard box and drew out a small white guinea pig. “I bought this. She's seven months old and her name is Pachimari according to Hana. I have no where to keep her but she's too precious to give back to the store.” 

Mako’s eyes lit up when he saw the pig. Tenderly, he lifted the small mammal out of Jamie’s hands as he spoke and held her close. “She's so small!” 

“Well yeah, she's not full grown yet and she's a girl. I figured you could help me and keep her. You still have your old one’s cage and food and stuff, right? I don't have any of that.” He shoved his hands in his pockets. 

“Yeah, I can take her off you hands. Want to come inside?” 

Jamie smiled, “Sure. It'd be fun to see her roam around.” 

The two went up to Mako’s room. The blond one sitting on the other’s bed as he filled the cage with new wood chips. Pachimari ran around somewhat scared as he did so. 

Once the rodent had water and food, Mako sat next to Jamie. “You didn't buy her on a whim, did you?” 

He sighed, letting his smile fall just a tiny bit, “No, I didn't. I bought her for you, but then my sister pointed out that it was rude to chose someone's pet for them. So you know, I kind of changed the story.” He ended his tale with a toothy grin. 

Mako chuckled, “Well, I love her. It is rude to choose someone's pet, but it's a nice sentiment.” He returned Jamie’s grin then laid back on his bed, letting his legs hang over the side. 

Jamie joined him, but quickly turned into his side to face his friend. “You can rename her, you know that.” 

The taller turned as well, “Yeah. I think I'll keep the name,” 

That only strengthened his grin. “I'm glad you like her. I mean, if you didn't accept her, I'd have to return her or keep her, and I don't think Jack would appreciate that. And like I said, I don't have anything for her. On top of that, I'm pretty sure the pet store has a no return policy, so you know--” 

“You talk a lot, you know that.” 

Jamie chuckled, “Yeah. I have a lot to say.” 

“Is there anyway to get you to shut up?”

He shrugged, “A couple I guess.” 

Mako smirked softly, “I bet I know one way.” Without much warning, he leaned towards Jamie and captured his lips in a soft kiss. 

When he pulled away, Jamie was frowning. 

“What are you doing, mate?” 

Blush rose in his face. Had he done something wrong? “Kissing you.” 

“Yeah, I know. But why? You have a girlfriend, and I thought the we both agreed you would probably never fall for me.” 

“With Zarya…” He paused, “It's complicated. And I thought you wanted me to fall for you.” 

“Well yeah. But I mean, this almost feels too easy. I mean I shouldn't complain, but it feels wrong.” He sighed and stood up. “I should get home. Maybe we can talk tomorrow?” 

Mako sat up and nodded, “Yeah,” his voice sounded a little hoarse. 

Jamie offered him a small smile, still remaining optimistic in this awkward situation. “Send me pictures of Pachimari, will you?” 

He nodded again, “Yeah, sure.” 

Jamie lingered in the room for just a second longer before leaving.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EDIT: three more people commented in this while I was writing this chapter and I am crying from happiness. I love you all. 
> 
> Woot. Seven hundred word chapter. I am so desensitized to the world. I am either dying inside or dead on the outside, you feel? 
> 
> Idk. I don't think anyone reads these notes because I write angsty shit in them. But listen, I have shit to say about this fic. Like, this is a bridge chapter meant to connect the last chapter and the next. Also, I have no idea how to write Zarya, but she is my buff bara wife, and Roadhog is my buff bara son/husband and junkrat is my trash son who is disgusting but I love him. 
> 
> I love them all.

Mako made sure to sit down with Zarya the following Monday morning. He cleared his throat before speaking. “I've been thinking, and I think we should stop seeing each other.” 

She nodded, not appearing to be upset by this news in the slightest. “I was about to suggest the same thing, you see, I think I'm actually really gay.” 

He was silent for a moment, “Really? I was about to say the same thing. I think I was just using you to force myself into accepting societal norms.” 

She nodded again, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms as she did, “I understand exactly how you feel, because you see. I was about to say the same thing.” 

He gave a low chuckle, “I'm glad this is going to be amicable.” 

Zarya nodded once again. “I'm glad too.” She stuck out her hand for him to shake, “Still friends?” 

Mako shook her hand with a curt nod, “Friends.” 

She grinned and stood up, “Excellent. Now, if you will excuse me, I have somewhere to be.” 

Despite it being such a short encounter, Mako felt like he the conversation had fulfilled its purpose. Content with the results, he stood up after the other had left and went in search of Jamie.

He found the skinny boy in the library, talking with Hana and Lucio. With a small, shaky breath, he walked over the the group and spoke. “Hey.” The greedy was almost purely directed at Jamie. 

He seemed to get that and jumped up from his seat, “Oh, hiya mate, need something?” He was already leading Mako away despite asking if he was the one who needed something. Nice cover up Jamie, just flawless. 

Once they were in the hall away from the others, Mako spoke again.“I broke up with Zarya. You said we should talk?” 

Jamie nodded, “Oh, sorry to hear that mate. And Yeah, I said we should talk, but honestly, I don't have anything to say.” 

“We could talk about the kiss and what it means in terms of us.” 

For some reason, that made Jamie laugh. Not a little cackle or chuckle, just a full in laugh, and that in turn made blood rush to Mako’s cheeks. 

“What's funny?” 

He caught his breath but still grinned, “Nothing you said or meant, don't worry.” He placed a hand on his arm. “It's just that you're straight forward. I didn't expect it, but I should have. But yeah, we can talk about it. Let’s see, where to start.”

As he paused, Mako stepped in, “How about starting with how you feel?” 

Jamie nodded, “Okay. That's easy. I like you and think you're gorgeous and hot and I am very interested in pursuing both a romantic and sexual relationship with you. Cause damn you're sexy and sophisticated.” He ended his little spiel with a wink and a finger gun pose. 

“Okay, then why did you react the way you did yesterday?” 

“Oh, I thought I went over that. I like you yeah, but it didn't feel right, like, I didn't think you were into it because of just me, but you were into it because of a lot of factors. You kind of seemed emotional still, so it wasn't really you, you know?” 

Mako huffed, “What do you mean?” 

“Listen mate, I don't really know how else to explain it. But like, can I ask you a question? How do you feel about me?” 

He hesitated. After a pregnant pause, he answered. “I like you, I'd be happy dating you.” 

Jamie sighed, “Yeah. I don't know, I feel like you're content accepting the situation but not actively trying to get it. I feel like I haven't won you over yet, just like I've been given a pity fuck. You feel?” 

“I honestly have no idea how you feel.”

He shrugged. “That's fine. Maybe I'm just seeing things from a weird perspective.” 

Mako nodded. 

The smile returned to Jamie’s face. “Cool. Let's touch base on the subject in a couple days. But for now, let's just be mates.” 

He nodded, this time a bit slower. He could wait a couple days. 

But Jamie disappeared the next day, and he wasn't back in a couple days.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can anyone guess what happens in the next chapter? Leave your guesses in the comments, please. I am starved for attention.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you guys know that I love you all? If you are reading this authors notes, and you read the last ones, and left a comment. I love you. like seriously. participation makes me so happy. I stayed up till eleven writing, trying to get this chap done for y'all. and that doesn't seem like a lot, but i'm an old man and i usually go to sleep at nine. 
> 
> i love you. 
> 
> just a warning, there is some graphic descriptions in here. and some mentions of eating disorders and mental illnesses and just general self hate. but they do kiss. so yay. idk how to write kissing. lol. 
> 
> sorry. lol. i'll write a cute chapter next time.

Jamie wasn't gone for just a couple days, he was gone for nearly a month. That was when Mako started getting worried. Well, he was worried from the first day he didn't arrive at school. But that fear got progressively worse. 

First, he convinced himself that the boy was just sick. Jamie didn't really care about personal hygiene so it made sense, and it was excuse able for him to miss a couple days due to an illness, maybe even a whole week if it was bad enough. 

So, Mako texted him when he could, not pressuring him about a relationship, just texting him nice little things, like pictures of Pachimari and updates on classes and their small group. 

When week two of his absence passed with no reply, his worry got worse, maybe Jamie was seriously ill. He stopped texting him aside from the occasional meme, because, memes. 

Upon week three, Mako was afraid the worst had happened;Jamie’s foster parents had grown tired of the boy or were intolerant of him being gay and had sent him back to where he came from. 

The first Tuesday of December, marking the end of the third week since Jamie’s sudden disappearance, he shuffled over to Hana and started a conversation. “Hey, what happened to Jamie?” Yes, direct as always. 

Hana looked up at him, not at all phased by him speaking to her. “He's at home, just kind of taking an extended leave from school. I'm sure he'd be up for visitors if the visitor was you.” 

“What does that mean?” 

She pouted, “You're no fun. I mean, he's heads over heels for you. I thought that much was obvious.” 

Mako blinked slowly. It was kind of infuriating to deal with social people who assumed he knew nothing and talked to no one. “Yes, I knew that. I meant about the visitors. Has he not let anyone see him?” 

“Yeah, he’s being a real recluse. You know your guys’ two other friends? The emo looking girl and the edge lord? They came over a while ago and he refused to see them. But I think he'd like to see you. Wanna come over?” 

Of course. Mako should have tried to visit earlier. Apparently Amelia and Gabriel already had that idea. Probably individually though, if it had been a group event they would have invited him. After a minute he nodded. 

“Cool. Let's go, my dad's going to pick me up in just a second.” 

“I thought you walked home,” 

“Not today. It's going to snow today, and I am not walking home in weather like that.” She started out the doors. Mako followed her. 

It took significantly less time to drive to the perfect little house in the suburbs than it did to walk to it. 

Mako made sure to thank Jack for driving as he got out and was lead to the house by Hana. 

She lead him upstairs and to the room Mako had been in several times since the the first time he was forced into it by that damned debate project. He stood to the side and let her knock on the door. 

“Jamie, someone's here to see you.” 

He responded almost immediately, and somewhat muffled by the door, “Tell ‘em to fuck off.” 

Hana out her hands on her hips despite him not being able to see her stance, “You can't say that! What if Mom or Dad were here? Plus, that's no way to talk to your boyfriend.” 

He hesitated to respond, “Boyfriend? Are you talking about Mako?” 

She smirked, “Yep. Are you going to open the door?” 

“Open the door your damn self.” 

Hana rolled her eyes and turned to Mako, “I'm guessing that means you can go in. I wish you the best of luck. Like seriously, he's been in a mood since the middle of November. It's tiresome.” She walked off, leaving Mako alone with the door and Jamie. 

He sighed and knocked in the door to alert the boy on the other side. “I'm coming in.” That probably wasn't necessary, but he was raised to be polite. 

He opened the door to reveal Jamie sitting on the bed in shirt athletic shorts and a t-shirt that read ‘MILF’ in pink sparkly letters. Oh, and he was missing two thirds of his right arm and leg. 

Jamie averted his gaze as Mako stepped into the room. He didn't say anything.

Mako pulled off his face mask once he was in the room and the door was closed. He was comfortable enough with the other he felt he should be able to see how he felt. 

Frowning, he sat on the edge on the bed. “What happened?” 

The blond shook his head, “I don't want to talk about it. It's stupid.” 

“Okay, is there anything you want to talk about?” God, he had no idea how to do this. 

Jamie shrugged. After a moment he scooted over and rested his head in Mako’s shoulder. “I don't think I feel like talking.”

Mako nodded. “I understand how you feel. I can talk for the both of us this time.” 

He seemed to mirror his nod. 

He shifted his position so how arms were wrapped around the smaller who was now sitting between his legs. He usually wasn't one to start physical contact or anything like this, but he just seemed so upset.

Jamie leaned into his touch, resting his head on the other’s chest and reaching a hand up to rest it on his large forearm. 

Mako sighed softly and began talking. “Not much has been going on at school. Amelia has gotten in trouble several times for showing cleavage. She upset about that since she isn't dressing any different than she was in fall, but apparently since it's not appropriate for winter, it's a problem suddenly. Gabriel got a job at hot topic and he hates dealing with thirteen year olds. But he really likes the discount he gets. Pachimari got bigger. She really likes celery and Timothy grass, she doesn't like coming out of hiding though. She's still super shy. But when she doesn't come out, she's very vocal. I sent you some pictures and videos.” 

Jamie nodded. “I got them. They were cute.” 

He nodded as well, “That's good. You know, I was worried you got kicked out or were seriously ill. I mean, this isn't good, but you're still here.” 

“I almost wish I wasn't.” 

“You don't mean that, do you?” 

He sighed, “I guess I don't. But I mean, this is so fucking stupid. I’m so fucking stupid. And physical therapy is going to go on for almost a fucking year, and I don't get a stupid arm until July. All I can do is hobble around right now. I'm so god damn weak. And Angela is trying her hardest to take care of me. She stays home every hour of the day just in case I might need something. She's given up her life for me. It's the worst.” 

Mako didn't notice he was crying until he felt warm tears drip onto his arm. He didn't say anything. 

Jamie took a soft breath. “They've all set their lives on hold and I don't deserve it. I did this.” 

“What do you mean?” 

He paused. “Mako, it's my fault I'm mangled and a disgusting freak now.” 

Mako was silent for a moment, trying to find the right words to say. “You're still Jamison Fawkes. And as far as I'm concerned, Jamison Fawkes isn't and never will be disgusting or a freak, even if your appearance changes.” 

Jamie inhaled shakily as he moved his hand to intertwine their fingers together. He didn't say anything for a couple minutes. Neither of them did. 

Finally, when the blond stopped sniffling, he spoke. “Mako, you know, I think I love you.”

“Yeah, I think I know that. I love you too.”

He went silent again. “I know I’m really emotional right now, and this might be all my hormones speaking or whatever. But do you want to maybe make out?”

Mako gave a deep chuckle despite himself. “Sure. Third time’s a charm, right?”

Jamie managed to turn around Mako’s arms, this time smiling though tear tracks still stained his cheeks. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. We have really sucked at making out so far.” He enunciated that thought with a giggle. 

Before either of them knew what was going on, they were making out. This time, it wasn't just one of them giving the other a single kiss only for it not to be returned. This time, both of them, leaned into it, their mouths moving against each other's. 

Just as Jamie got his hand under Mako’s sweatshirt, Angela knocked on the door and popped her head it. 

“Dinner’s almost ready, is Mako going to be staying?” She didn’t seem to be phased at all by the display in front of her. 

The two teens pulled away from each other, both blushing heavily. 

Jamie shrugged and looked to Mako, Angela still standing in the doorway, apparently expecting a response. “Do you want to stay for dinner?”

He shrugged, “I can, just let me text my parents.” 

Angela beamed, “Excellent. Wash up and I’ll see you downstairs in a couple minutes.” She almost left. Almost. She walked back into the room at the last moment. “Jamie, let me look at your burns real quick okay?”

Jamie moved off Mako’s lap with a groan. “I already told you, they’re perfectly healed.” He turned to Mako, “You know where the bathroom is, right? This’ll just take a minute.”

Mako nodded and left the bedroom. 

Once he was in the hallway, Hana ambushed him. “Soooo, did you get him out of his mood.”

He shrugged, “Maybe.”

She nodded, “Interesting. Well, not that I was eavesdropping or anything but I’m confident that he didn’t tell you about how he got his little…. Injury.”

“Nope.”

“Well, would you like to know?”

“I don’t really think it’s your place to tell me.”

She huffed, “Well he’s never going to tell you. This whole thing has gotten him all depressed and shit. But honestly, I think he was all depressive before he blew himself up otherwise this wouldn’t have happened. When he’s manic he does stupid shit like this, but I mean, he has enough sense to be around people so he’s safer in general.”

He paused, “What the hell are you talking.”

“Wow, swearing in front of a girl, rude. But what I’m saying is Jamie shows signs of having bipolar disorder. Haven’t you noticed? He’s either manic or depressed, I mean sometimes he has neutral phases.” She shrugged, “Or are you asking what I mean by how he blew himself up? By that, I mean, he literally blew himself up. I think he was entering the downward part of the mood swing. That’s important, see, otherwise he wouldn’t have been alone that Monday afternoon. And someone would have told him not to try and make fireworks better. And even if they didn't, they would have told him to stand further away.”

“Wait, so, he literally did this to himself?”

She nodded, “Oh yeah. Luckily Mom was home, and she has medical training. So when he was lying screaming in the backyard without a leg and his arm half torn off, and shards of bone and other shrapnel lodged in his skin, she knew what to do. I think it still horrified her though. But she did stop him from losing too much blood, which was really needed, because, did you know, he’s anorexic?”

Mako bit the inside of his lip, “Why are you telling me all this?”

Hana gave another soft shrug, “Jamie’s not going to tell you. It’s not because he doesn’t trust you, it’s because he wants to look strong in front of you. He does love you a lot, and he trusts you a lot more than anyone else, I mean, he let you see him.”

“Maybe I don’t need to know these things.” 

“I think you do.” She put a hand on his arm. He immediately pulled away. “Mako, I’m not trying to air his dirty laundry to try and be mean. I’m not jealous of your blossoming relationship. It’s just that I can be Jamie’s confident, but I can’t be his rock, and I can’t influence his decisions. You can. You need to know what’s wrong in order to help him. Look, I know this is a lot of stress, but I think you might be able to handle it. If not, then don’t feel bad, he’ll be safe anyway.”

Before Mako could respond, Jamie walked out into the hall, using Angela as a crutch with a prosthetic leg on. 

Hana slipped away at his appearance. 

Jamie turned to Angela, “I’m not sure if I’m up to making it down the stairs. Can we eat in my room?” 

She nodded, “That sounds fine. I’ll bring your food up.”

Jamie shook his head, “It’s fine, I can send Mako down. Speaking of that, he can help me around. You deserve a break Angela.”

She nodded and handed him off to Mako. 

Soon enough, the two teenage boys were sitting cross legged on Jamie’s bed eating the food so thoughtfully prepared. 

Mako spoke first, “Why don’t you get a cane instead of using your mom to help you around.”

“I have a cane. But it’s stupid. I can walk on my own, but she insists on helping me. She’s too damn nice, it’s bad for her health. Heck, I only had you help me so she would be placated and leave.”

He nodded and fell back into silence. 

Jamie sighed and put down his fork. He wasn't doing too well with his non dominant hand anyway. “Did you talk to Hana?”

“Yeah. why?”

“No reason really. Just, She thinks she’s a psychiatrist or something. She thinks she knows what’s wrong with everyone. If you want my advice, I wouldn’t take anything she says too seriously, you know?”

Mako shrugged, “Okay.” 

He smiled, “Cool. Hey, you want my food? I’m not going to eat any more; it’s kind of hard with just my left hand, you know?”

“Sure, I’ll take it. I’m surprised your parents actually make vegetarian meals.” He reached over to take the plate.

“Not usually, like, once or twice a week to try and win me over or something?”

Mako gave him a deadpan stare, “You’re not a vegetarian.”

“Not in the true sense. I prefer to not eat meat, but I’ll eat it; I’m not picky about food. I mean, if I land some place where I can’t get vegetarian meals, then I’ll be screwed, you know? So why not build up tolerance for meat in the meantime?”

He nodded, not responding. Not that that mattered; Jamie spoke up a moment later. Again. 

“Say, are we dating now?”

He shrugged, a light smile on his face. “Sure, why not?”

That made Jamie beam, “Cool.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is like, two thousand words from where I want it to be. Stupid five hundred word bridge chapter. 
> 
> Idk. I'll try to make longer chapters in an attempt to catch up. for example. this chapter is like 2700 instead of 2000. shrug. i'm trying. 
> 
> did you know that i have researched amputation so much. like, two hours of my life have gone away due to this. but whatever, it's fine. i'm just trying to write this as best I can. if i'm not, please tell me. if you're confused, please ask. if you like this, please tell me so i can revel in the attention of strangers on the internet.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has come to my attention that some of you may think I'm cute. This concerns me. All I do is complain, and irl I am very loud, paranoid and annoying, I'm not 'uwu life is hard~' I'm 'ÒHÓ everything sux!!!1!! I'm edgy ÒAÓ' 
> 
> Anyway, onto the fic. I have learned that Zarya should be called Alex but meh, I'm not fixing it. 
> 
> This chapter contains sex talks and alludes to self harm. Also, if I titled my chapters, I would title this one, Ratscrew because the rat. Gets screwed. Õ3Õ
> 
> Also, I'm only one thousand words behind now. And I tried to show the touchy feely side of the trash babies now that they're dating, so tell me how you feel about that.

Mako went up to Jamie’s almost everyday after school. He took up the role of bringing home the other’s homework and tutoring him in all the classes he was missing. So Angela really didn't mind that they closed the door when they were up in Jamie's room. Yes, she knew they were dating, but she hadn't heard them have sex yet, so all was good. She was hoping they would hold out until Mako convinced Jamie to go back to school--and she knew he would eventually. Once that started happening, she would force them to keep the door open. 

Her fears that they would have unprotected, premarital sex under her roof was realized one Friday evening. 

She was just innocently walking down the hallway to away some towels she had washed when a shout from Jamie’s room made her stop in her tracks. 

“Faster! Come on, you're so slow, you have to go faster Mako.” 

Angela stopped by the door. Maybe that could be a purely innocent comment? Still, suspicion took hold of her as she strained her ears for any other clue as to what they were doing. 

To her horror, she could hear the bed shake and soft slapping sounds as well. 

With a horrified face, she let the folded towels fall out of her hands as Jamie yelled again, “Come on, faster!” 

Hana walked out of her room and walked to her mother, “They're so loud, what are they even doing?” 

Angela frowned at her daughter, “I think they're having intercourse.” 

“No way really?” She leaned closer to the door to hear the sounds of the squeaking bed herself. 

A moment after she did, a loud slap sound could be heard, followed by muffled commentary from Jamie, “Ow! Not so hard.” 

Hana smirked, “Ooh, spanking? Kinky?” 

Angela gave her a disapproving frown, “You shouldn't know about that, you're only fifteen. And that's not kinky, it's one of the most vanilla kinks.” 

“Ew, mom, are you telling me that you and dad do worse things?” 

She rolled her eyes, “Let's not talk about this.” She went back to listening to the pair of apparently horny teenagers in the bedroom. After a minute she shook her head and turned her head to Hana, “Should we interrupt them? Like, open the door?” 

“Ew no!” She practically shrieked, but that didn't stop the boys on the other side of the door. “I don't want to see any part of that!” 

She sighed, “Then we should at least knock on the door, and let them know that we can hear them, right?” 

Jack came up stairs and out his face close to his wife’s. He dropped his voice to a hushed whisper to match both girls’ voices. “What are we talking about.” 

Angela turned to him,only a little startled by his sudden appearance, “What we should do about Jamie and Mako. They’re having intercourse.” 

“Oh that. I can hear the bed moving from downstairs. I figured I'd come find you and see what you wanted to do.” 

She huffed, “I want to stop them.” 

He shrugged. “I mean, if we do open the door, will they even stop, or will they just yell for us to leave? We should wait until they come downstairs and talk to them.” 

“Jack, this isn't right! I do not condone this. They are underage and not married.” 

He put a hand on her shoulder, “I understand. But if we force them to stop, they will still do it, but they will be unsafe. We can tell them it's wrong but that they should still come to us.” 

Hana raised a hand, drawing both her parents’ attention back to her. “Does this count as my sex talk?” 

Jack gave a low chuckle, “Sure, your first one at least, you'll get another once you become sexually active.” 

Before Angela could protest or Hana could make a smart remark, another shout from Jamie was heard. 

“Ha! I win!” 

Hana looked to her parents. “Can you win at regular sex or only gay sex?” 

The door to the bedroom swung open before a word could escape either of the adults’ mouth. There in the doorway stood a fully clothed Jamie wearing Mako’s hoodie. 

“Oh hey, is there like, a party going on in front of this room that neither of us were invited to?” 

All three blink owlishly at him. 

Hana recovered first as she gave a low whistle. “You clean up fast after sex.” 

It took a second, but Jamie burst out laughing, “We were having sex?” He looked over his shoulder to Mako who was shuffling cards. “Did you know we were having sex?” 

He shook his head, “You should have told me sooner. I would have put away the cards.” 

Jamie cackled and looked back to his adoptive family. “Why would you think we were doing that?” 

Angela flushed, “You were saying lewd things! And the sounds that came from the room and the bed, those couldn't possibly have come from just a card game!” 

He shrugged, “Well they did. I mean, it's one hell--” Jack and Angel glared at him. “I mean heck, sorry. It's one heck of a wild game. Ratscrew, you heard of it?” 

Mako got up off the bed and stood behind Jamie. “It gets pretty violent.” 

Jamie nodded, “Yeah, each person starts with part of the deck, and you flip cards until you get a face card. The next person has a number of chances depending on which face card it is to get another face card, if they can't do that, then the person who placed the first face card gets the pot. Whoever gets the entire deck wins. Also, you can slap on doubles to get the pot. It's usually such a fast paced game, but Mako here,” he shot the taller a half hearted glare, “Is super slow with flipping his cards over. I swear, he's trying to cheat. Anyway, we should all play.” 

Jack cleared his throat. “Er, no. I think that we should have a talk.”

He groaned. “I don't want to talk about condoms or abstinence with you guys. Like seriously, I know what I'm doing, and I don't think it's going to happen just yet. Okay?”

Angela frowned, “I'm not sure that's good enough.”

Jamie huffed. “Do you want me to stop everything, come find you, tell you were going to have sex, and show you the condom I have?” 

Jack frowned, “I think you're being very disrespectful and crass first of all, and second, if you think you have a handle on this, fine. But just know we're here to support you and to talk. Okay?” 

He nodded, “Cool. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go fetch some Oreos.” He shouldered his way past his family and headed down stairs, keeping his left hand on the wall most of the time. 

Angela turned to Mako who was left there. “You're not going to deflower my poor boy are you.” 

He didn't seem too a,used by that question. “I'm not going to do anything of that sort of that's what you're asking.” 

She nodded, “All right. Well. That's good.” She stood for a moment longer in front of the bedroom with her family before picking up the towels and walking off. The rest followed suit. 

Jamie was back in his bed room with a sleeve of Oreos in a couple minutes. He offered some to Mako as he sat on the bed. 

Mako took some, “Thanks, now give me back my hoodie.” 

He pouted, “But I'm cold.” 

“Wear your own damn hoodie.” 

“It's not the saaaaaammmee. It's not big or soft and it doesn't smell like you.” He pouted harder and leaned on the other. 

Mako just rolled his eyes, “I'm cold too, and you know that I'd rather not have my arms exposed.” 

Jamie huffed and took the hoodie off. “It wouldn't be as bad if you stopped. You know that, right?” 

“I'd still have scars.” He pulled his navy camp hoodie on once he had it back and watched Jamie do the same with his marijuana hoodie. 

“Yeah, but, I think everyone has scars. It's just part of living.” He shoved a cookie in his mouth. “I think there's some sort of quote that's like, ‘Everyone is born a blank canvas,’ and I think that life is the way we get painted. Scars and freckles and piercings and stretch marks are all just parts of who we are. They might not be intentional, they might be intentional, but they all come together to make a masterpiece that is us. You know?” 

“Thats a nice way of thinking, Jamie, but the only quote I've heard even close to that is the theory of nurture versus nature that states, ‘the human mind is a "blank slate" without rules for processing data, and that data is added and rules for processing are formed solely by one's sensory experiences.’” 

Jamie was silent for a moment. “Okay that too. Society pushes some bullshit onto our otherwise innocent minds, like, do you know how fucked up that is? Some dude was like, ‘I think this is normal.’ And it wasn't. But he told everyone it was. And his voice was loud since no one spoke up, too afraid they were weird. And now we just call it society. It's really just messed, you know?” 

Mako chuckled softly and ran his hand through Jamie’s unruly hair, “That's not what it means. It's an argument saying that humans have to learn everything and they have no instinct.” 

He hugged. “I think that the two things I said are both better ideas and observations than that. You should start quoting me instead of old dudes.” 

He rolled his eyes with a smile, “Yeah. Sure. I'll do that.” 

That seemed to pacify Jamie for a minute. He leaned against Mako eating Oreos for about two minutes before speaking again. “Hey, honey?” That was one of the things Jamie seemed to pick up since they started dating; calling Mako pet names as if they were an old married couple. 

Mako played along, finding it both cute and amusing, “Yes, sugarplum?” 

“Are we going to have sex? Like, I'm not asking for it right now or anything. I'm just curious if it'll come up in the future, you know?” 

He sighed, honestly wanting to ask where this came from. But it was painfully obvious where the topic came from. “I already promised your mom I wouldn't deflower you.” 

Jamie snorted, “Well you can keep your promise then. I'm not a virgin in any sense.” 

“Even so…, I'm sorry, but I don't know if I want to. Or if I'm ready. 

“Okay. That's totally fine. I'm not trying to pressure you into sex or anything, I'm just curious.” He leaned up to kiss Mako. 

Mako kissed back reluctantly. “Are you sure you're okay with that? Isn't that like, a big part of relationships?” 

Jamie shrugged, “Maybe. I don't care. I want you to be happy.” 

“Well, I want you to be happy too.” 

Jamie moved so he sitting in Mako’s lap, an arm wrapped around his neck. “You seem a lot more upset about this than I am. What's up?” 

“I don't want to talk about it.” He turned his head away. 

“Aw come on. This really girly magazine I stole from Hana said that talking to your boyfriend was super important in keeping a relationship alive.” He started to nuzzle the other, 

He sighed, “That's the thing Jamie. What if us not doing it breaks us up. Or at least makes one of us start to loose the passion? I don't want that to happen, but it feels inevitable, and I don't want to think of it.” 

“Hmmmm,” Jamie pressed his mouth into a thin line. “That's pretty awful to think about. You know. I don't think that will necessarily happen, especially if we continue to talk about things, you know? And if it does, I think we'll be able to deal with it when it happens. You know, rekindling the spark, or ending things amicably. But let's just live the high school life and be happy for right now. Yeah?” 

Mako sighed heavily. “That’s not a solution or comforting,” 

“How's this for comforting. I don't need sex, and I already love you, so you don't have to worry about me getting bored. As long as I get to see you, I'm fine.” 

He leaned back against the wall, finally bringing his arms up to wrap them around Jamie’s waist. “You would see a lot more of me if you went to school.” 

The blond groaned and slumped against his chest. “Did Angela put you up to this?” 

“No. I want you to come to school, and so do Amelia and Gabriel. And you said it yourself, your mom needs a break.” 

He huffed irritably. “I'm not telling her to take care of me, I'm perfectly self sufficient. She cares too damn much.” 

“Maybe. But you should come back to school anyway, just to show her how self sufficient you are.” 

Another irritated sound came rim Jamie, “Fine. Just so I can spend time with you and give Angela a break. I'll go back after the holiday breaks.” 

“That's fine, I think.” 

“Yeah,” he didn't sound excited in the least. “I'm going to get so many stares, and whispered comments from fuck heads. It's going to suck.” 

Mako brought a hand up to run it through the other’s blond hair as a sort of way of comforting him, “You have all winter break to prepare yourself mentally.” 

“I guess. Speaking of which, will you come visit me over the break?”

He was silent for a moment. “Sorry, I can't. My family is going to see our extended family. I'll be gone until the fifth of January.” 

Jamie groaned. “Great. Another thing to look forward to.” 

He shrugged, “We can do something fun when I get back, okay?” 

“Fine, but I'm holding you to it. Now kiss me you darn fool.” 

Mako chuckled and happily complied. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol. I fooled you. There's no sex. :P just sex talk. 
> 
> I love ace Roadhog. I also love projecting my insecurities into fictional characters! 
> 
> Also, the card game Ratscrew is in fact a game I play. It involve a lot of shouting, fast flipping, and slapping. 
> 
> Just FYI, I love you all. And I love you commenters. I just. Love you all so much. It makes me cry p. I love you. <3
> 
> On a side note. Idk what I'm doing plot wise. Shrug. I figured idk wait until they were dating, but now what? I want one of my fics to reach 30000 words since I'm pathetic and never got that far. So I figure might as well get to their marriage or some shit. Get to them in college. I honestly have no idea what I'm doing anymore. (It was mostly Planned out till now) please help me. Send suggestions?


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edit: I forgot to mention. Their school system is based off of mine, which is really not normal. Five periods a day and three tris a year. I get 7.5 credits a year, which I think is more than normal. :D which means our school allows electives like release time. Which is in class bible study, but so many people use it s in school study hall. Anyway, let's get going. 
> 
> Okay, eating disorder mention. Drug mention in this chapter, 
> 
> Idk how to write high people. But I decided that Gabriel is angry high. Every one is high in this fic. (That's why it's high school au. Lol)
> 
> Also. Gabriel gets a boyfriend because I can. It is Jack Morrison, but shhhhh. Jack is Jamie's foster dad in this au, but also he goes to highschool. To avoid confusing you, highschool version of Jack never is called Jack. 
> 
> Also, both Amelia and Lucio are chill with talking about disorders. Amelia is used to dealing with Lena who has/had a heart condition. Lucio had a leg deformity when he was younger but got some surgery for it, so they're both cool with talking about it. 
> 
> Hana's a shit. I love her. 
> 
> Also, I stole reed cx's (?) idea for the date. I think it was them. I deleted the first chapter ten so I can't check. 
> 
> I was originally going to have them go swimming because I thought it would be fun. But then I was like, Jamie wouldn't agree (but it would be fun to see him in floaties just angrily trying not to drown in the shallow end) and mako wouldn't agree because he would have to take off his mask and shirt in public. Plus, it's January still?
> 
> So amusement park. Shhhh. You can totes go to an amusement park at night in January.

Winter break for Mako was relaxing, fun and filled with family. 

Winter break for Jamie was also filled with family, but not as fun as he wanted it to be, not without Mako. As soon as he saw his boyfriend--God, he just loved that word. Boyfriend. Anyway, when he saw his boyfriend again in the evening of the sixth of January, a couple days after school had started again and a day after he was back in town, he clung to him like lichen does to a rock, or blood stains to clothes, or other similes. 

Mako stepped into his bedroom, causing Jamie to jump up from his spot on the bed then fall. He planned in running over to the other and hugging him, but that didn't work. Instead, Mako had to go to him, and pick him up. Still, he got to wrap an arm around his neck. 

He buried his face in the other’s shoulder. “I missed you. I couldn't even text you because you were out of the country.” 

Mako loosely wrapped his arms around the thinner one. “I missed you too. But you know, you would have seen me a lot sooner had you gone to school.” 

Jamie looked up at him, pouting, “I didn't want to go without you.”

“I was there today and you weren't.” 

“What's one more day? I mean, it's been like three months now, right?” 

He sighed, “Yeah, which is why you should come. You can learn a lot more if you actually go to school instead of having me re-teach you.” 

His pout retreated, only to be replaced by a scowl. “I know. But, it's probably helping you. I was reading this article and it said that teaching let's one learn at a higher standard than being taught, because you have to memorize and understand the material enough to explain it clearly to someone else. Come on, haven't your grades improved since you've started helping me?” 

Mako shrugged, “I guess. But yours are bad aren't they?” 

Jamie mirrored his shrug. “I have a C average now. It's okay.” 

He sighed again, “That's not good. I'm picking you up for school tomorrow, okay?” 

He pulled away from his boyfriend and sat down on the bed, “Okay. But you're not my parent, and I'm not your child. You don't have to do this.” 

He sat down next to him. “No, but I want to be with you, and if this is the way to get that to happen, I'll do it.” 

The blond kept scowling. He was silent for a moment. “I feel like you've been put up to this though. I want to be with you too. But I mean, does it have to be at school? The administration understands that I need to be at home, and you, Angela, and Hana are the only ones who are really worried about me going back.

“I want you to go back, how does that translate to me being put up to this?” 

He shrugged, “You shouldn't care about me going back. It makes no sense. I think Hana and Angela talked you into talking to me, they think you can control me.” 

Mako paused, “They don't think I can control you. And you should come back, it makes sense, you will learn better, not to mention Amelia and Gabriel are concerned.” 

Jamie hugged himself around the middle. “I texted them. And I will come to school tomorrow. But I still don't like being coerced. You're making me feel paranoid.” 

He raised a pierced brow. “I'm making you feel paranoid.” 

He rolled his light brown eyes, “You're not forcing me to have emotions, but what would you like me to say? Your actions, while they make perfect sense to you, confuse me, because I can not read your mind or intentions, and become fuel for my paranoid thoughts?” 

“That could be a start.” Mako paused again, “If you know why it's starting to bother you, why do you still feel that way?” 

“I can't just stop feeling paranoid mate. Can you stop feeling asthmatic?” He answered the question for him. “You can't. It's just something you're stuck with for some time.” 

He started chewing on his bottom lip. “Okay. Well, I think I should get going. To reiterate though, I haven't been put up to this, and I'll be here tomorrow morning to get you.” 

Jamie nodded, “Yeah okay, I'll be here. See you tomorrow.” 

 

The next morning, Jamie was pressed into Mako’s side as they walked to school, Hana walking in front of them. 

Jamie chattered away. “So I was texting Gabe a couple days ago, he said he couldn't talk much since he got a boyfriend. Who is it? I be it's that blond guy on the golf team, right? They've been giving each other bedroom eyes since October.” 

“You've only been here since October.” 

He snorted, “Yeah, and if I can see that, then it's obvious they're in love, you feel?” 

Mako sighed and kept walking. 

Jamie frowned and pressed closer to him. “Are you mad at me?” 

“Not more than usual, why do you ask?” 

He shrugged, “I acted-- ah, what's the word? Abrasive. Yeah, I acted really abrasively yesterday and you seemed put off or angry.”

Mako shrugged as well, “I'm not really angry. I'm irritated you don't trust me, and that I couldn't really talk you out of those thoughts.” 

The blond stopped, forcing the other to as well. “Babe, I trust you. It's just that, there's really no way to stop those thoughts, you know? It's not anxiety, it's not that I'm scared or can't see it any other way. I know it's probably wrong, but everything is screaming that you're lying to me and everyone is against me. I trust you, but that's not going to stop me from thinking you're lying just to manipulate me, even if I know that isn't something you would do.” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, “You know what, it's stupid. Let's not talk about it. Bottom line is, I trust you, and I love you. Okay?” 

Mako bit his lip, though it wasn't really visible. “Yeah, okay.” 

Jamie shifted his weight, “Can I get a kiss?” 

The taller snorted, mostly amused at the other’s now sheepish attitude, but complied and kissed him. 

Hana go to the end of the street before realizing the others had stopped moving with her. She turned around, “Stop making out and start walking! Gosh, your gayness is going to make me late for geography.” 

Jamie chuckled and took Mako's hand and started walking again. As they moved, he started talking again, “Before you left, you promised we could do something fun when you got back. I was thinking going on an official date. It would be our first one i think.” 

“You're right, you've stayed inside the entire time we've been dating.”

“Not true. I went to the store with Angela once. And let me tell you, going outside isn't that great. People aren't rude, but I mean, they stare or say, ‘I'm so sorry.’ I don't need damn pity.” He huffed, “But, I'd rather not talk about negative things right now. Want to go to an amusement park sometime? I checked, and the local ones are already starting to start up.” 

He raised a pierced brow, “Really? In January?” 

“Yeah. It's cold, but there's no snow or rain, so why not. The water rides won't be working till late April.” 

Mako nodded, “We can go. Let's go tomorrow night.”

That only made Jamie whine, “We should go tonight. It's Friday and it'll be fun.” 

“We both will have homework.” 

“So? We'll have all weekend to do it!” He started to swing their joined hands, “Come on muffin, let's go.” 

He sighed, “Fine. But my parents probably won't agree to letting me go on a date with you, they find you uncouth. Let's get a group together.”

“Fine. But we have to split up for at least an hour.” 

He grunted in agreement. 

Hana slowed her pace so she was walking side by side with them. “You guys going out tonight? Can I come?” 

The taller shrugged, “Sure.” 

She beamed then ran ahead into the school. 

 

Mako had two periods out of the day where he didn't see Jamie, math and chemistry. So the first time he saw his boyfriend--hehe, boyfriend--was second period in p.e. The smaller one had decided to forego getting dressed in the black and gold gym clothes and was talking to the gym teacher when Mako walked in. 

When class actually started, he was curled up in the bleachers looking utterly lost. Though, he did smile and wave whenever he caught Mako's gaze on him. 

The next time he saw him was fourth period, aka free period. He was already curled up in his seat, listening to music through headphones. Mako sat down next to him. 

Jamie took the headphones off, letting the metal he was listening to be heard if one was listening close enough. He beamed, “Hey honey bunches, how's your day been?” 

“Fine, yours?”

“Pretty good. But you wouldn't believe the amount of tests I've had to make up, you'd think teachers would give me a day to prep, but naw. They figure since I've been doing my homework I can take them.” He leaned his head on Mako’s shoulder, “I'm tired too.” 

Mako brought a hand up to pat his unruly hair. “Understandable. At least you have an hour break.” 

“Yeah.” He closed his eyes and remained quiet for the majority of the class. 

When the time came, they walked to lunch, hand in hand, and sat down at the typical lunch table. 

Gabe sat down shortly after them, smelling of weed. “Sup, hombres.” 

Mako raised a brow, “Why are you high?” 

“Had a sub last period, so I snuck off, told the bae to skip and we got high in the locker rooms. Then we fucked, it was great.” 

He rolled his eyes, “Good for you man.” 

Gabe nodded, “Anyway. Jamie, haven't seen you in a few months. How'd you lose your arm?”

Yeah. He was just straight to the point. Good ol’ high Gabriel. 

Jamie fidgeted a bit in his seat. Instead of answering the very blatant question, he turned to Amelia once she sat down, “Hey, you're still with Lena, right? Do you two want to come with Mako and me to an amusement park tonight?” 

Amelia sat down, rolling her eyes as she did, “We're still together, and hi to you too. But I'd like to come, let me text her.” 

Game kept talking, though he didn't like being ignored. “Hey, ass face, listen to me. How'd you ding yourself up?” 

Jamie kept ignoring him, “Kay, well, tell me your guys’ answer. I think Hana's going and she might bring Lucio. Gabriel’s welcome to come as well, but he should probably be sober for it, you know?” 

Now, that really pissed Gabe off. “I'm right here, you don't need to talk about me in the third person. What the fuck man? Do you think your better than me? Huh? Huh? Them's fightin words.” He pushed himself up from the table, keeping his hands pressed against the vaguely sticky lunch table. 

Amelia pat his shoulder, “Gabe, hon, sit your gay ass down and eat some fries. They're crinkle cut, your favorite.” 

He shrugged her hand off, “I don't want damn fries. I want answers. Like, why the fuck Jamison is ignoring me.” 

Jamie sighed, “I don't want to talk about it, there, happy?” 

“No!” He stormed away. Or so it seemed. He was just making his way around the long lunch table to get to the other. Once he was on the other side, he punched the blonde. 

Jamie jumped out of his seat to fight.

Mako pulled him back, Amelia did the same for Gabriel, having to lunge across the table to do so. 

Their actions backfired, though only on Mako. Jamie had apparently gone into a fight or flight sort of response and he had chosen. When held back, he lashed out at whoever was holding him back instead of the threat. Which only lead to Mako being punched. It didn't really hurt him, more like irritated him. 

With a glare, he let Jamie go, “Fine.” 

Apparently, that brought him to his senses. Hesitated for a moment before grabbing his drawstring bag and walking out of the lunchroom. Only after flipping Gabriel off, of course. 

Mako didn't see him the rest of the school day, and only when he got home did he notice he had a text from Jamie. 

“Sorry m8. I lost my temper, I didn't mean it and you didn't deserve that. I hope we're good? We still on for tonight?” 

He sighed and texted back, “We're still on for tonight if you want. Has anyone replied to your invite?”

It only took moments for him to reply. “Yeah, Lena and Amelia are coming, I don't think Gabe wants to.” 

“Your sister too, right?” 

“:0 Right! I forgot. She said she's bringing Lucio. Are they dating?” 

“You're the one who should know.” 

“>:3c Right.” 

Mako sighed again. “Hey, where did you go after lunch? Did you go home?” 

“No. I didn't skip, I just went to go make up some tests. Were you worried, or did you just miss me?” 

“Stop being an asshole.” 

It took him nearly a minute to respond that time. “Right, sorry. I'm fine now, just FYI.” 

“Figured, with all your cheesy smiley faces.” 

“>:0 they're cool!” 

“Sure. I'll pick you up tonight around seven, okay?” 

“Right on, mate.” 

 

A couple hours later, Mako was driving Angela's minivan. Again. He could have driven his mother’s car, but no, he had to drive this stupid minivan on the freeway. Why? Because Gabriel and his blonde boyfriend decided to show up last minute. 

Yeah, Mako was upset. He didn't want to drive this giant death trap and Gabe was bitching about being forced to apologize and now Jamie was curled up in the passenger seat, meaning he was upset himself and just this date was looking pretty bad so far. But he didn't let his agitation or disappointment show in his face. He just drove. 

Hana spoke up just before they were due to turn into the freeway, “Let's grab dinner at a McDonalds drive through before we get to the park. Food in those things is always so expensive.” 

Mako nodded and began looking for a McDonalds. “That works for me. Just everyone figure out your order.” 

Soon enough, they were in a drive through, with Mako relating everyone's orders, “....and a large chocolate shake and do you guys have Mountain Dew?.... Okay then a large Mountain Dew. Can you hold on for just a second?” He turned to Jamie, “What do you want?” 

Jamie poked his head up, looking almost surprised someone was talking to him, “Oh? Nothing, I'm not that hungry.” 

Hana stuck her head into the front seat between Mako and Jamie. “I'm going to tell moooom!” 

He shoved her face back, “Fuck off you gremlin.” 

“Stop shoving me!” She bit his hand, forcing him to retract it. “I'm serious. If you don't eat. I'll tell mom, and she'll send you to an inpatient ward.” 

Mako raised a brow, as he was prone to do, “This true?” 

Jamie huffed, “Maybe. I don't have a problem though, so she has no reason.” 

He shook his head, “You still need to eat. I'm ordering you some fries and a coke.” That was the most generic thing, but at least it was something. 

The other huffed again but muttered a thanks then turned to Hana, “Thanks for airing out the dirty laundry in a full car, by the way.” 

She shrugged, “No problem,” 

As they drove away with their McDonalds, Gabriel’s boyfriend spoke up. “So. Uh. Jamison, why does your mother want to send you to and inpatient ward?” 

Jamie wasn't having any of that. “Wow, you're just as rude and blatant as your slimy boyfriend.” 

Hana answered instead, “He's not gaining any weight, which means he's not getting any better about his anorexia.” 

“Shut up Hana, you don't really have the right to talk about this.” 

“Well you aren't.” 

He let out a heavy sigh, “Fine, since everyone's apparently curious, I guess it's story time.” He twisted around in his seat, something Mako would have scolding him for, except he looked really upset. 

“Okay, one. I lost my limbs playing with modified fireworks. Don't do that kids. Two, I'm not anorexic, because I eat. I was just losing weight quickly because apparently I wasn't eating enough,” he used air quotes, “And Angela cries constantly because I'm underweight. She thinks it's her fault. She says she should have known because she's a nurse and she's already helping me recover physically, she just can't take it anymore. That's why she wants to send me away. But look, I stopped losing weight, I'm just not gaining it as fast as she wants, so the threat still hangs. Cool? I'm fine, I'm not dying, I don't need help for mental or physical reasons. I don't need pity. Are we all cool?” He turned around in his seat without waiting for an answer. He then proceeded to put in earbuds so he didn't have to listen to anyone. 

No one really said anything for the rest of the ride, except Lucio and Amelia who tried getting people to lighten up. 

At the park, Jamie took Mako's hand and started in a different direction than the rest of the groups after promising to meet up and text regularly. He started swinging their hands, “Hey, I'm sorry.” 

Mako looked down at him, “What for?” 

“I don't know. Being emotional. I'm just kind of a wreck right now, and that can't be fun for you. I just want you to know, I love you, and you mean a lot to me.” 

Mako cracked an unseen smile, “I love you too.”

Jamie's entire face lit up, “You do!?”

He couldn't help it, he chuckled. His boyfriend was just too damn cute, “Yes, I love you.” 

He kept smiling, “I'm glad. But anyway, is there anyway I can make it up to you, for being all over the place I mean?”

“Mmmm, you can win me a stuffed animal.” 

He nodded, “I'll win you a million!” 

“What if I want a billion?” 

He hesitated, “Well, I think that's a little unreasonable.” He paused before bursting out in laughter. “Come one, let's find a booth that has a prize you like.” 

They ended up in front of a ring toss booth staring at a large pink pig. Jamie slapped a five dollar bill down and got his rings. 

Three out of five rings were misses. And only two were thrown. Yes, Jamie dropped a ring, and since it was over the counter. It counted. Mako was beginning to believe he wouldn't even get a participation prize. “Do you want me to throw the last few rings for you?” 

“Naw mate, I got this. I have to do this for you.” 

“Mate?” He smirked, “Haven't heard you call me that in a while, what happened to all the honeys and babes?” 

He shrugged then threw the fourth ring. It missed. “Figured you didn't like those cutesy nicknames.” 

The attendant offered some sage advice. “If you get the last ring on, you can still get this small one.” So wise. 

Mako shrugged, not worried about the stuffed animal. “I'm fine with them, they're cute.” 

“Do you want me to call you them again?” 

“Yeah, we have to prove we're the dominant couple. Gabriel's boyfriend and Gabe are trying to out cute us, they were cuddling the whole ride over.” 

Jamie made a gagging face before chuckling and chucking the last ring. It of course, missed. 

The attendant gave a weak smile and handed Jamie his consolation prize: a phone dangly featuring a tiny version of the pig stuffed animal. 

Still, Jamie beamed and turned to Mako, “I present to you, Mr. Bacon, your present from me to you.”

He took it with a smile, “Did you just name him for me? You have a bad habit of that.” 

“Yeah. If we adopt, I'll try and name our kids too.” He took Mako’s hand once he had attached the small pig to his phone. “Let's go ride some rides, yeah?” 

The night ended with them atop the ferris wheel like a cliche movie. Jamie was all grins at that point. “Kiss me when this thing stops, okay? Even if we're not at the top.” 

Mako chuckled again, for what seemed like the millionth time that night, “You're so goddamn cheesy.” 

“Yeah. But I don't see you complaining, in fact, I think you smile more when I do this cheesy shit than when I don't. I should totally think of a great way to ask you to prom.” 

“You don't like dances though.” 

He shrugged. “We can go if you want.” 

The ferris wheel stopped. Mako pulled down his mask, “I love you.” He kissed him tenderly. With that, their perfect night ended.

 

Okay fine. Their night didn't end there. They still had to go home. But that was damn cute.

Their night ended with Mako giving Jamie a piggy back to the fountain at the front of the park because the shorter was tired and unused to walking around so much in one day. They sat on a bench and watched the lights on the rides change colors as they waited for everyone to gather. 

Jamie rested his head on Mako's shoulder and ran his thumb over the back of Mako's large hand. He mumbled softly as he did. If Mako tried, he could make out what he was saying, and it was mostly just sweet nothings. 

They drove home almost half an hour later than planned. And once they got back to the house with the perfect picket fence and yard after dropping everyone off, Mako was honestly too tired to get into his Mother’s car and drive back to his house down the street. 

One call later, he had permission to sleep over. And that's how he spent his night, spooning Jamie in the bedroom he had been in too many times.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a cute ending to a fanfiction. uwu. 
> 
> Lol. It's not over. 
> 
> I had chapter 11 up but it's a bridge chapter and if I can't get chapter 12 or past done then 11and beyond is useless. 
> 
> But this is a cute non-addictive ending. People liked it until this. So. Yeah. 
> 
> If I want to or can I'll write more. Maybe even if people want me to. Idk. I'll just tack my ideas on but not right now. For now I'll nap. So sorry.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who's fucking back. 
> 
> Hint. It's me. 
> 
> Now, all y'all who've been following this story for some time will know what to,expect from this chapter seeing as you've read it. 
> 
> Anyway, enjoy the prom chapter, then I'll talk about me in the end notes. ;)

Three months later, Mako and Jamie were still happily dating, and it was the middle of April. Graduation was only a month and a half away for seniors, but that didn't matter since they were both juniors. The only one concerned was Gabriel who would lose his boyfriend. 

Most of the small group of emo/punk/goth/gay kids were worried about one thing and one thing only. Prom. It was just a week and a half away and tickets were to go on sale at any moment. 

It was a hot debate topic at their small table, whether they should go, and if they should go as a group, if they were going ironically or not. 

Honestly, Mako fully expected to go unironically either as a group or on a date with Jamie. He was expecting a cheesy as hell prom-posal any day now. 

He knew it was coming when Jamie kept stealing glances at him during fourth period--their study period. This was going to be great. 

Just before the bell rang, he spoke. “Hey Mako,” 

He smiled underneath his face mask. “Yeah?” He tried for the life of him to sound innocent and unsuspecting, 

“I think we should break up.” 

Oh. OH. That. Was not what he was expecting. “What, why?” 

He shrugged as the bell rang. Both remained seated. “I still like you, just so you know. You haven't done anything, no one's telling me to do this, no one has replaced you, nothing like that has happened. It's just that, well. I haven't told you till now, but I'm graduating this year.” He stopped talking, giving Mako a chance to speak. 

“But why are you breaking up with me now?” 

“Yeah, asshole move. But I want to make sure you're okay. I mean, we got pretty serious. I want to make sure you have your friends and that I'm not leaving a big hole. Because come June, I'm not going to see you again.” 

He slumped back in his chair, “Jamie, it doesn't have to be like this, we can keep contact even if you go to college or get a job or whatever you plan on doing.” 

He sighed, “I mean yeah. But I'm going to be so busy, I won't have time for you. You deserve something more, someone better. I don't want you to be tied down. I promise it's just better this way.” 

“It doesn't sound better!” For the first time since they met, Mako raised his voice. 

Jamie visibly flinched. He was silent for a moment then stood up. He placed a hand on Mako's shoulder, “Listen, I love you. But I think we should break up, okay?” 

Mako’s heart was beating so fast he wasn't sure he could say anything. Or think of anything to say. Hell, he was getting so worked up, he probably needed his inhaler. 

Usually, Jamie would be the one to press the little red device into his hand and convince him to use it, but now, the smaller boy was walking out of the deserted classroom.

As he left, Mako swore he heard him say, “Take care of Pachimari for me.” 

As soon as the weird blond fellow forced himself into Mako’s life--his friend group, his heart, his home even-- he slipped out and was gone from all of them. 

Their gazes never locked in the halls. Jamie never sat near Mako in classes. Their friends didn't talk about his disappearance from their life either. He was just. Gone. 

But Mako did go to prom. He made sure to go with Amelia and Gabriel, who both left their dates behind for half the night to make him feel better. He didn't see Jamie at prom either. He didn't know whether to feel disappointed or relieved. 

Honestly, he just felt sad, after all, Jamie was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That was a fun chapter. :) it was very well received last time I put it up.
> 
> Yeah, I'm back, because I want to become a popular fanfiction writer. I mean, this is my first story to get on an ao3 feed on tumblr, wich is one of my dreams. And I check those consistently. I got on one, so yay me. 
> 
> But I have two more goals. To get on a fic rec list, and to be acknowledged by yazzdonut, my hero who probably is irritated by me. Now, I don't want to guilt anyone by telling y'all my goals. So, if you ever feel like this is good enough to recomend to someone, please do, please tell me so I can die happy. Or if you're making a fic list of highschool au or roadrat, you can link me if you feel I make the cut, but I mean, I am constantly looking at those lists. 
> 
> Anyway, I figured I can't meet any of my goals unless I post more fiction, plus I haven't met my one goal of 30000 words. I got to 20000 wich is good, but not great. 
> 
> So, I'm going to post more. Expect fluctuation in posting dates unlike last time, because I'm an anxious/paranoid mess and I currently hate posting my stuff and I'm busy with college classes. But, I think I'd much rather write, something I almost hate now, instead of doing homework. 
> 
> Enough about me. What did you think about this chapter? Did you miss me? Where do you think this will go in the remaining four chapters? Are you ready for college?


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's college-stuck. Er. Au. I have nevr read homestuck, totally. 
> 
> Lol, enough of my thirteen year old humour. I don't know how college works. Yes, I am taking college classes, but not at a university, and I am not at dorms. I take them online or in highschool. :P made you think I was over eighteen. 
> 
> And like ususal, IDK how to write high or drunk people. So. Yeah.

Jamie sat back in the chair in the small cafe, the thick straw of his boba tea in his mouth as he looked across the table at his sister. “So, you can plainly see I’m looking well, you can tell mom I’m doing great.”

Hana leaned forward in her seat, almost as if she were trying to counter his leaning back, to keep some sort of regulated distance between them. She rested her elbows on the small circle table and pursed her lips, “You do look pretty good. But I’m not just going let you order food sit down, and tell me you're fine. I came all the way out here to spend time with you, to catch up. I’m not just some spy for mom, you know.”

“Yeah, yeah, but you’ll admit that that is a part of your identity, won’t you?”

She shrugged, letting a small smile take over her face. “I guess. Not out of malice of anything, but she does worry.”

Jamie too, let a smile overtake his face, though his wasn't cute and small. His was large and somehow loud though it was just a smile. “And even after all that stress I put her through, she still looks so youthful.”

“That’s her superpower, I swear. Anyway, enough talk about mom, how are you doing?”

“Great, like I said. How are you, I realized I haven’t asked you yet.”

She waved a hand as if that also batted away his words and ideas from the air. “I’m fine. But never mind that, we’re still talking about you. How are your classes?”

He shrugged, “Pretty good. I mean, the work load is sort of killing me, but I’m keeping up and managing stress. Having fun and all that. How are your classes?”

“I don’t know if you can call them classes. I’m just taking two classes online. I just want to take a gap year, you know, try to find myself and all that. I know it sounds cliche, but backpacking Europe sounds amazing. Maybe I can find myself a foreign girlfriend. Boyfriend maybe. I don’t know, do I even want a significant other at this point in my life?” She seemed to be unaware that the other had managed to shift the focus onto her, or at least off of him. Maybe she noticed, but she didn’t seem to care.

Jamie nodded, “I understand. Sometimes you just don’t want to deal with all that emotional stuff. But still, the physical part of that is great. Honestly, the thing I miss most about being intimate is the cuddling. You kind of have to get into all those messy emotions in order to cuddle someone.”

She started nodded, eyes closed as if that further noted her agreement, but she cut her nod short as her eyes snapped open, “Wait. Does this mean you haven’t been intimate with someone for a long time? Wait, how long?”

“Emotionally? Not since Mako…” He trailed off, and resumed sipping at his drink. 

“Wow. That’s like, almost three years now, right? That’s a long time to go without sex. I didn't think you would be able to last that long.”

He was silent a moment longer as he removed the straw from his mouth. “Oh, you mean physically intimate. Oh no, I’ve been having sex all over the place. Just like, rampantly. I mean, most of it is safe. Plus, Mako and I never did it, and I wouldn’t cheat on him. So if I hadn’t had a hook up since him, it would be closer to four years. But yeah, sex is great. I miss that from a relationship, but the great thing is you don’t even have to be in a relationship to get it. I mean, I’m surrounded by stressed, horny teens without adult supervision. I could fuck anyone I want to.”

Hana pulled a face, “Oh my gosh, please tell me you’re joking.”

Jamie chuckled loudly, “Not in the slightest. I actually had a one night stand with my roommate about a week or two back that turned into something more. It’s been kinda awkward since, because I think he wants something more emotionally fulfilling. He keeps giving me these longing stares, and I’m trying to take notes on the chapter. It’s just really kinda sad on his part, so I've been indulging him. I think I need a new roommate, but I know the university will never put me with someone else.”

“If you got a new roommate, wouldn’t you just try to fuck him too?”

“Well, yeah, but only if he was into it too. Turns out that Jesse also happens to be a super gay amputee. Funny how we ended up being put together.” He grinned yet again.

Hana shrugged, “Well the second term is coming up, I’m sure you could request a new roommate and see who they put you with.”

“Yeah, I guess. But they seem very reluctant to move me out of a room with Jesse. I mean, we’ve been together for like, two and a half years now. Jesse is a constant in my life, I feel like we should include him in our christmas cards. That’s how intensely the university is pushing our roomy relationship.”

“Okay, but what if I hack the university’s crap and reassign you?”

“Yeah, that would work, if you knew how to hack.”

She stuck out her tongue. “You know that I can. If you keep mocking me, then I won’t help you.”

He huffed, though he was still smiling. “Okay fine, I take it back, you’re the best hacker ever. Now get me a roomy that I won’t be tempted to have a one night stand with.”

“I can’t tell their sexuality from their names!”

“Then get me an ugly roommate. Like a Craig. Craig’s are always ugly. When parents give birth to an ugly baby, they name it Craig.”

She puffed out her cheeks, “That’s rude. I’m going to find you the hottest sounding name. And the gayest sounding one. Like, a Chris, or Randy.”

“You know what, fine. Maybe I can actually hit it off with someone. Call me once you have it set up?” He stood up, his now mostly empty drink in his hand. 

Hana stood up too, “Yeah, okay. I have to ask, you’re not still drinking all the time and using weed, are you?”

“Do I look drunk to you?”

“No. I don’t expect you to show up to this drunk or high, but I mean, I worry just as much as mom. A little more about your substance abuse considering I haven’t even told her about it.”

He shoved a hand in his pocket, “Yeah, I appreciate that and all, but I’m not going to class that drunk, I’m getting perfect scores on everything, and I’m taking tests sober. It’s fine. It’s great.”

“But you still are drinking? And smoking?”

He shrugged, “It’s a stressful time in life. I’m not hurting anyone, not even myself. It’s chill Hana.”

She sighed. “Fine. And you’re still texting mom everyday?”

“Yep. And I make sure to text her pictures of my weight. This is my third year doing this, Hana, I’m fine on my own, I promise. I can even start sending handwritten letters home, if that would make you feel better.”

She sighed but smiled softly. “Okay. We’re all just worried about you. We love you." She reached across the table and hugged him around the middle, resting her head on his chest. 

He wrapped both arms around her. “I honestly don’t know why. But yeah, I love you too. All of you, dad and mom too. Be safe. And call me if something cool happens.

Hana shifted her position slightly so that it was her chin resting on his chest, allowing her to stare up at him, “Yeah, okay. I’ll leave you to do your homework.”

“Yep. Love you.” He pulled away from her. With one last wave, he left. 

 

It wasn’t until almost a week later that Hana called Jamie. 

He cleared his throat as he held his phone up to his ear, “Hello?” Was he trying too hard to sound un-high? Was that too formal?

Hana skipped over the greeting almost entirely. “Hey Jamie, so you know how I’ve been hacking shit for you, and looking for a roommate for you?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I was looking and a name popped out at me. And I was like, ‘whaaaaat,’ guess who goes to your school?”

Fuck, that’d be hard given his current state, “Someone I know?”

“Hell yeah! Mako Rutledge. I mean, how many other Mako Rutledge’s can there be in the world.”

Jamie was silent for a moment. “Do you think they’re all beautiful like he was?”

“Was? I think he’s still the same. He’s gotten meaner and bigger, but he hasn’t really changed that much. I thought he was going to the community college but I went over to his house, and he wasn’t there. So I went to find Gabe since Gabe is super gay and in the loop. See the trouble I go through for you? I went to that stoner's house. 

“He told me that Mako comes home on weekends to spend time with his mom. But he goes to the university now, on his super cool motorcycle. I knew someone in our neighborhood had a motorcycle cause that shit is LOUD, but I didn’t think it was your big snuggle bear.”

Jamie snorted, “He’s not my snuggle bear. But he goes here? I thought I would have seen him. Maybe we don’t have the same classes.”

“I mean, you’re a year ahead of him in terms of credits, right?”

“Yeah. Still, I thought I would see him. Whatever. Did you just call to tell me that Mako Dreamboat is at my college. Maybe I can have a casual hookup with him.”

There was muffled dialogue before Hana spoke again. “Nah. Gabe says he’s super fucking pissed at you. And He’s not interested in sex, or your scrawny ass for that matter.” She broke out in laughter. There was a muffled deeper laugh in the background as well. 

Jamie was silent for a moment, “Wait, shit, you still over and that guy's place?”

“Yeah. He’s pretty cool. He offered me weed.”

“Are you high? I thought you were super against marijuana.”

“Meh. I sub.. succ... I was convinced with peer pressure. It’s chill. It’s not good for you though, you have to keep up a good appearance for mom and dad and go to class. I sit around in my pajamas and play viddy games and read memes.” She snorted. “And learn about your boooooifriend for you. Do you want me to make him your roommate for you?”

God, compared to how baked Hana seemed, Jamie was completely sober. Well, he was only slightly high to begin with. “You know what. Put me down if he doesn’t already have a roommate. I’d like to see him again, after all these years.”

She snorted again. “Oh my gosh, what are you, an old man?”

“Hana, just, put me on there. And stay with Gabe or Lucio for another hour or two? Kay? And don’t mock me for wanting some sexy man to be my roommate. That’s just so rude. Literally so rude.”

There was more laughter from her side, though it was deep. Too deep to be hers. 

“Dammit Hana, am I on speaker phone?” 

“Maaaaayybeeeee.” She giggled. 

He couldn’t help but laugh a little too. “You know what, it’s fine. Text me later with the details, kay?”

“Yeah, yeah. Love you, buh-bye!”

 

Two weeks after that, Jamie was walking down a hall of student housing towards Mako’s residency. He knocked on the door, sort of giddy, but mostly regretting his semi-high decfision making skills. 

Mako opened the door shortly after he had heard the noise. “Can I help you?” There was no reaction on his face to show that he recognized Jamie, and everyone could actually see his facial expression now that he had ditched his face mask. 

He didn’t know whether to be downcast or ecstatic that Mako didn’t recognize him and didn’t start shouting at him on sight. He decided to grine nonetheless, “I’m your new roommate. I don't have key to this place, and I thought it would be rude to just walk in all unexpected, you know?”

“That’s true. But I already have a roommate.”

He held up his bionic hand to waggle a finger. “The university said you complain on a couple different occasions that he hadn’t been around for ever and he hadn’t returned the key. So they gave me to you.” That wasn’t true. Because the key hadn’t been returned and the year hadn’t ended, the other roommate was technically still Mako’s roommate, but there was still an opening for Jamie as a roommate.

Mako sighed, but stepped aside to let Jamie in, “Fine. Well, I’m Mako.”

“Coolio. I’m Jamison, but you can call me Jamie.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol. Was gonna write more, but then I decided that this was the perfect way to end this chapter. 
> 
> Tell me what you think is going to happen or how I can improve. Please. Or anything. I love reviews.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol. I wrote most of the second half on my phone or tablet. Pardon spelling mistakes. 
> 
> Most of the original writing was done at a desk so I looked professional. Until someone came up behind me and saw the title of my doc.
> 
> Oh, btw. This has graphic depictions of gore? Like. Losing limbs. Idk if it's that graphic. But the experience was described, not really the scene. You feel?

Jamie winked at Mako as he stepped inside. 

Mako froze for a second as his pupils shrank. After a very long moment, he spoke. “You look different.”

In his defense, Jamie certainly did look different. He had finally gotten his arm and his final leg, both were orange. And his shoulders had gotten broader, not to mention his hair had changed. There was a bit at the end of his now long, unruly hair, that was dark brown with orange tips, left over from the time he tried to dye his hair. True to his hunch, he didn’t keep up with it, which resulted in his have two colored tips. 

He chuckled in response, “Yeah, it happens. You look the same. I mean, you took off your mask. I can see your face again, it’s really pretty like usual.”

That wasn’t the right thing to say in the slightest. His eyes grew dark. “Shut up. You don’t care about that. What are you even doing here, huh?”

He held up his hands, palms out, “Hey, no need to get angry. I’m just your new roommate, probably just that. I mean, well…” He trailed off but quickly snapped back to attention, “I’m not trying anything, I’m just trying to get an education and shit.”

He frowned, “I don’t believe you but, fine. I’ll be accommodating for now.” 

Jamie had a feeling the only reason he was being ‘accommodating' was because he didn’t want to get expelled for punching him.

But that was fine, as long as Jamie had a place to stay that wasn’t with Jesse, everything would be fine. 

Well, it would have been all fine and dandy had Mako not dug out his cell phone from his pocket and turned to Jamie, “Do you know the number for the student help line?”

He cocked his head, “No, why do you ask?”

“I’m going to try to get you out of here, and I need to call.” His face betrayed no emotion as he spoke. 

Jamie frowned deeply, his rather unruly brows furrowing as he did. “I thought you said you were going to be accommodatin’.”

“I said for now. I’ll let you sleep here for tonight and whatever, but I still am sure as hell going to get you out of here.”

“‘Kay, fine, whatever, it’s all good.” He still couldn’t help the fact that his mood had been considerably dampened. At least that was more finite than the anxious mix of giddiness and terror he was feeling moments before.

With a light shrug, Jamie walked to the bed that was clearly not Mako’s and sat down on the plain bedding. He threw his drawstring bag on the floor and leaned back. “I’m going to go to sleep, wake me up if something important happens.”

Mako rolled his eyes and shot something that resembled a glare in Jamie’s direction. 

The smaller shrugged and fell asleep, only to be woken up an hour later by shouting. 

He fell off his bed, wide eyed, almost paralyzed with fear. He recovered a moment later and stood up, this time irritated. With his mouth pressed into a firm line, he glared at the nearly seven foot man in the room, “What the hell is going on? Why the fuck are you yelling?”

He threw his phone onto his own bed and turned glaring to Jamie, “I can’t get rid of you. Just what did you do to get put in here so permanently?”

“Nothing! I just got put in here. Chill. Look, I’m not going to try to get into your pants like I did with my last roommate, and I’m not going to bring up the past, if that’s what you’re worried about. We can just pretend that everything is fine, that we have no connection. Okay? Now, let me go to sleep.”

He bit his bottom lip. “Okay, sounds fake, but okay.”

Jamie frowned, “Don’t meme with me. I’m trying to go to sleep.”

“It’s like, eight, why are you going to sleep now?”

“I’m tired. Besides, my sister is coming over tomorrow to help me move all my shit in here before the term starts.”

“Why didn’t you just do it tonight?"

“I can’t really drive, so I don’t have a car. And I’m not going to go back and forth between two buildings with a bunch of boxes. Be reasonable Mako.”

He was silent for a moment, “Oh right. I guess you can’t drive with the whole leg thing….”

He glared, “Yeah. It’s easy for you to forget considering you don’t live with it everyday.”

“God, Jamie, it’s been three years since I’ve even seen you. Don’t get so hung up on this. Why are you so pissy all of a sudden?”

“Just whatever. I’m going to sleep. It’s fine, sorry for getting pissy.” He got back on the bed under the covers, still in his street clothes. He made sure his back was turned to Mako. 

“That doesn’t answer anything.”

The blonde grunted and fell back asleep, not before remembering to actually take off his artificial limbs. 

 

It was about six hours before he was woken up again by his own mind. 

Jamie’s eyes shot open as he nearly screamed out in pain. The only thing that was stopping him was the knowledge that was was sharing a room with Jesse--someone who really did not appreciate being woken up by screaming in the middle of the night. Wait, scratch that. He was currently sharing a room with Mako. Though he probably wouldn’t like being woken up either. 

He brought a hand up to slap over his mouth, only to find that it wasn’t there. 

Right. That was what was causing his so much physical and emotional pain. The pain in his arm and leg that were no longer there is what brought tears to his eyes, but still, he did not cry out. 

Instead, he got out of bed, not bothering with the prosthetics lying on the floor, waiting for him, and left the dorm as quickly as he could. 

Once he was in the hall of the dorm room, he let himself cry loudly, or at least louder. Small sobs escaped his lips as he hobbled down to corridor, leaning mostly on the wall. 

Once he was outside, did he allow himself to completely wail. He slid down the rough brick wall and sat on the floor, wailing. Only for a minute. 

It wasn’t that the intense burning pain he was feeling was too much for him, it was the pain coupled with how emotionally exhausted he was and the feeling of losing his limbs. The dream he had had dug up memories he didn’t really want to face.

When he was lying, covered in his own blood, caught somewhere between screaming, being in shock, and passing out from the pain. He remembered seeing the face of his mother, known only as Angela back then, lean over him, tears streaming down her face as if she were the one bleeding. She spoke, but he can’t remember what she said. All he knew was that was the first time he truly worried her, and the first time he knew she loved him. He remembered lying in the hospital with Hana sobbing at his bedside, softly, as if trying to hide the fact that she was upset. He remembered Jack taking off a month of work to be with the family, and taking off even more time to start driving the kids around or cook dinner while Angela rested. 

Yes, the fact that something so traumatic made him open his eyes to how this small, already together family had accepted him. But it made him feel awful. They worried so much, and to see they’re tired faces, with sunken eyes, and disheveled hair, crying when they thought he wasn’t coherent enough or not around to hear, hurt already. He didn’t need some bullshit nightmare to turn their pale faces ashen, and their bodies into lifeless husks. That was scary. And to have them turn to him with deep holes for eyes and to confirm his worst fears? That was even worse. Though, the worst part of it was waking up with the phantom pains all while emotionally compromised. 

And so, he sat outside at 2 AM, breathing the cold air, crying as he tried desperately to calm himself down. 

He didn’t notice much around him. He was vaguely aware he was sitting on cement and how badly he wished he had grabbed cigarettes on his way out. But not much else. 

A large hand grabbing his own, pulling it away from his now bleeding and scratched up upper arm was the thing to pull him away from his trance like state. 

Jamie’s breath caught as he looked up to see Mako. He forced himself to take a breath, “What?”

Mako sat down next to him, still holding his hand, though not in a romantic way. “You shouldn’t hurt yourself, there’s enough people from the world who want to hurt you, so don’t be a contributing factor. Weren’t you the one who said that?”

He manage to crack a small grin, though tears kept falling, slowly now. “More or less.” His voice cracked noticeably as he tried to play it cool. 

Mako stood up, pulling the shorter male with him. “You should get inside. Do you need help?”

His smile broadened, though it wavered, “Honey, you know I need all sorts of help.”

He shook his head slowly, “Don’t do this. This is a sort of serious situation, I don’t need you to switch moods suddenly or put on a facade or try to make the situation light. Just be you, okay?”

Jamie felt the urge to start picking at his arm again, but that wasn’t really a plausible outlet considering his bony hand was still being restrained by Mako’s larger one.

Instead, he started to gnaw on his lip. “Yeah, okay. Sorry. You still gonna help me back up to the room?”

He sighed but nodded. With a bit of shuffling their positions, he helped him back to the room. 

Once there, Jamie crawled to the bed he had claimed as his own and lied down, still shaking almost violently from the whole ordeal. 

With another sigh, Mako walked over to him and sat on the bed, making the aged mattress dip under his weight. With slight hesitation, he wrapped his arms around the other’s wiry frame. “Okay, you need to calm down if you want to get back to sleep.”

He chuckled softly and tried to shrug off his arms. “That’s the thing mate, I don't think I want to go back to sleep. And even if I did, I’m not sure I know how to calm down.” 

His thicc arms remained in place, “Yeah, that’s why I’m here. Breath, and name one thing that you can hear.”

Jamie once again tried to shrug off his arms. “That's not going to do shit, bug off.” 

“I'm not going anywhere. And naming off your surrounding and being more aware of your senses does help. It grounds you in reality, I know what I'm doing. I have a psychology major. Now stop being an ass and name off something you can hear.” 

Finally he relented, letting himself relax in Mako’s hold. After a tiny bit, he spoke. “I can hear your heartbeat.” 

“Good, describe it.” 

He pouted, “This is stupid.” 

Mako was rolling his eyes, but it was too dark to see. “Just do it.” 

“Fine, it's really deep. And it's kind of like swung eighth notes on a timpani. I would say bass drum, but I feel it has more warmth to it than power. You can feel it too.” His shakiness was already going down. 

“Okay, now list two things you feel with your hands.” 

“Um, the sheet. It's thin and almost coarse, like all the sheets they give out. I also feel…” He trailed off and placed his hand on Mako’s lower leg. “Your leg. It's hairy. But you don't have any bumps or anything on it, maybe a mole or two.” 

Mako ignored the hand still resting on his lower leg. “Okay, what can you feel with your body? Three things.” 

“I already did feel.” 

“With your hands. Now body. This can be your own body or what you're leaning against. Any part of your body but your hands.” 

He sighed, “K, well, I can feel my own heart. It's really fast and it's just bouncing around. I can feel you breathing. Your stomach rises and falls, like you're breathing with your diaphragm. Did you learn how to play an instrument or sing?” 

“Focus.” 

“Rude. Also the bed. It moves every time we do. That's three.”

“Good. Now four things you see.” 

“It's daaaaaark.” He rested his head on his upper arm instead of continuing. “Look. I'm grounded in reality now. Let's just stop.”

“Fine.” He moved to leave, but a thing hand suddenly moving from his leg to grip at his arm stopped him. 

Jamie spoke softly. “Hey, don't leave quite yet? I like leaning on you.” 

He sighed and settled back down. 

They sat in silence for a while before Jamie spoke. “We can't ignore the past. Can we?”

“Nope.” 

He sighed. “I don't dislike you. You know that right? I loved you when I left you. That feeling tapered off, but I don't hate you.” 

Mao was silent for a moment before giving a heavy sigh. “I was hurt. I resented you and now I dislike you. It's just an progression of feelings, nothing against you.” 

“Yeah.” He easy silent for a moment. “Thank you for tonight.”

“Of course. Can I go to my own bed now?” 

“Nah, not yet.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol. I still dk how life works.
> 
> Next chapter Hana shows up! And idk what I'm doing with my life or this fic. Send in suggestions or what you would like to see happen.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i live! 
> 
> i might add more chapters, because i feel like i know what to do but idk if i can fit it in one more chapter, but i don't want to have a weird number of chapters. like, i want it to end with a five or zero. i'm odd like that. 
> 
> anyway, i've almost reached two of my three goals. i just need yazz-senpai to notice me ;A; or be on a regular fic list. i did get on an ao3 feed.
> 
> Lol. My friend read this, and they made fun of me for writing in gudetama. Because I joke (not really) that he gave me an egg fetish. I just love gudetama so much.

Jamie vaguely remembered falling asleep in the comforting arms of Mako. but when he woke up, he was alone, with a warm spot left on his bed where the other was. He frowned. Mako probably ran away when he realized what they had done last night, which in all honesty wasn’t that bad. It was just a hardcore feelings jam and spooning. 

Jamie swung his leg(s) over the side of the bed and inspected the rashes on his arm that he knew would be there. Not too bad, they’d probably go away after a day. 

Before he could grab his prosthetics, Mako walked back into the dorm room with his hair around his face and no shirt. “Shower’s free.”

The blond cleared his throat, willing the heat in his face to go away. “Um, no thanks, I’m good.”

He pulled a face, “You’re not going to shower? Gross.”

He stuck out his tongue, “It’s not really. I don’t produce that much grease or sweat as much as you probably do. I only need to shower every other day.”

“That’s still gross, you’re going to get dirty that way, think about your skin too. It’s probably screaming to be washed or exfoliated.”

“No, I have too sensitive skin. If I wash more than once every few days, then I get rashes. Look, I’ve already got some from these stupid blankets,” He held out his arms for inspection.

Mako looked over, somewhat interested, “That could be from allergies, or from your scratching.”

He rolled his eyes, “Yeah, that’s why it’s on both arms, because I can physically scratch both. And no, I’m not allergic to anything, I’m just sensitive. It’s my personality.” He placed a hand on his heart.

He rolled his eyes, “Whatever, smelly.”

“I wear deodorant and brush my teeth and shit. I have basic hygiene!” He huffed and put on his prosthetics. “Anyway, do you have anything going on today, or are you going to be around when Hana and I move stuff in.”

“I’ll be around. But I’m not going to do anything unless you pay me in pizza.”

He raised a brow, “I am literally broke. Every cent I have goes to the university, you should know this.”

“Same. Which is why I want free pizza.”

He sighed, “I’ll see what I can do. I gotta get dressed. Let Hana in if she arrives?”

“Yeah, yeah sure.” 

With that affirmation, Jamie went to go get dressed, taking his drawstring bag with him. 

As soona as he was out of sight, there was a knocking on the door. Mako sighed and went to go open the door, after putting on a shirt of course.

Just as was expected, Hana stood there in her dusty rose short shorts and pink ‘G4M3 GRL’ shirt. She beamed up at Mako, “Heya! Long time no see, how’s it hanging.”

He grunted and stepped aside to let her in. 

She chuckled and made herself comfortable on the unpersonalized bed, just like Jamie had done. “Nice. You’re still a man of little words. I swear, you’re like the opposite of my brother. So calm, so grounded, so quiet. Anyway, you gonna help us move things today?”

“Am I going to get free pizza?”

“Sure! I’ll pay for it, I’ll even throw in free beer.”

He raised a pierced brow, “You’re underaged, so am I.”

She stuck out her tongue, “You're no fun, I thought college was the time for underage drinking. I mean, I don’t condone it, but if you wanted it, we could easily get it. Every liquor store around here thinks Jamie is over twenty one, or they’re just used to college kids trying to get wasted.”

He frowned, “Well, I don’t condone drinking while in school. This is the time to study, not party.”

Jamie walked back into the living area of the dorm, his hair slightly more tame and looking like Guy Fieri, what with his skinny jeans and flame decal shirt. “Aw come on, you gotta take the edge off somehow, and what about all that stress?”

“Do yoga.”

Jamie stuck out his tongue, “Lame. I don’t have time to do that, but you do you. Anyway, Hana, I’m ready if you are.”

She nodded and hopped off the bed. They walked out of the dorm together. 

Mako could hear them come back nearly two hours later as they walked up loudly to the door. He glanced at the door, then back down to his book, sipping at his tea. They could handle themselves. 

The doorknob jiggled, but they didn’t come in. The conversation outside faltered as they tried the door again. Soon one of them was just pounding on the door. 

With a huff, Mako set down his book and his tea and answered the door. “Didn’t you think to take your key with you? You should know these doors automatically lock.”

Jamie elbowed his way past the taller, “No, you didn’t give me a key. Cute glasses by the way.”

He took his round reading glasses off, “Didn’t I?” It took him a second, “Oh, Hanzo took the key and never returned.”

Hana’s face lit up, “You know what this means! We need to make illegal copies of your key!”

He frowned, “No we don’t. I’m still not really in the mood to break the law.”

She stuck out her tongue, “It’s a school rule, not a real law. Plus, unless you want to prop open your door or open each time we come up the stairs, this is the best solution.”

He stared blankly at her, “How about I just give you my key?”

“That works! But you are going to have to make a copy eventually because the upcoming classes… One of you will be locked out at any given time. If you want, you can get the copy, you can get a cute decal on it, maybe a pink pig?”

A small blush slowly rose in his cheeks. “Fine. Let’s make a copy.”

Hana smirked, “Awesome! We can go after we get these boxes inside.” She set her box down and started outside again without a key again. 

Mako sighed and just propped open the door. He put his glasses back on and returned to his book. 

Despite his attempts to stay out of their personal lives, he had somehow been roped into going on an errand with them, though he could still easily refuse them. But he was also listening to their conversation, this having been made easy through the fact the door was open. He tried to read his book, but his attention kept turning to their words as they walked in and out of the room. 

“Do you really think his glasses are cute?”

“Yeah, super cute. The way they sit on the edge of his nose. So cute, looks like something you’d see in a cartoon or in an image of a small animal. Cute.”

Hana snickered, “Yeah, or on an old man. Do you have a daddy kink?”

“Oh yeah, totally. My dick is just soooo hard for Mako, but only when he puts on those glasses. I can only ever get a boner anymore if I see men with glasses. If he were to initiate coitus with me, and he took of his glasses so they wouldn’t break, I would instantly lose my hard on. This is my curse.”

She probably smacked his arm, “Shut up, that’s gross. And no one says coitus, that’s gross.”

He cackled, “I say coitus. I’m just having so much coitus here at college. Every night, I participate in coitus with another one night stand, it’s truly great. Coitus coitus coitus.”

She smacked him again, this time harder and louder.

He only snickered. 

“But do you think he’s cute?”

“As much as I did when I first met him. I think a lot of things he does can be called cute, but his general description is more like, gorgeous. Whatever, it’s not like this is going anywhere if that’s what you’re getting at. Though, I guess we did sleep together last night, so I don’t know what that means for our future.”

“What! You slept together! You work fast. And I thought he was asexual.”

Jamie cackled “Nah, I just mean we spooned.”

“That’s still a pretty big thing.“

“Not really, I mean, I kind of forced him. Had a lil break down and made him stay with me.”

“Oh.” Her tone diminished, “What happened?”

“Nothing, it’s fine. Everything’s fine now, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“Mmmm. I’m still concerned but okay….” She sighed, “Hey Mako, wanna go get the copy of the key, and some food now?”

He looked up from the same page he had been pretending to read for the past fifteen minuted. “You’re done moving boxes?”

“Yeah! Still have to unpack though. Let’s break though.”

Jamie nodded in agreement, “I’m honestly too out of shape to do that much lifting and not take at least an hour break before doing anything else.”

He sighed, “Fine, let’s go.” He stood up, setting his book and glasses down. 

Fifteen minutes later, Mako was the one driving Hana’s minivan to the mall. How did he always manage to be the driver? Why?

Ten minutes after than, they were at the mall, and honestly. Mako felt like he was baby sitting. Every so often Hana or Jamie would tug on his hand to point at something, or complain. To be honest, he was glad they were tugging on him rather than running off like he feared they would. 

The tugging stopped when mako allowed himself to be dragged into the Sanrio store. Hana spent five minutes squealing at everything cute, and running around like a rampant child. Honestly, that was what Mako wanted to do, but he was composed. Instead, he stood near the front of the store and let Jamie stack small stuffed animals, several Machipari’s included, on his shoulders. 

Hana eventually came back with a large Gudetama in her hand. “I’m going to get this lazy egg. But before I do, I realized something, you two haven’t really talked in three years! Like yeah, you’re familiar with each other, but three years is a lot, you should really talk to each other as if you haven’t met each other. Like, what are your majors? Where do you work? What do you plan on doing? What would you say is your biggest accomplishment.”

Jamie ignored her and took the egg out of her hands, “This is a cute fella.”

She punched his arm.

He winced but chuckled, “Hashtag, worth. I’m not giving this lazy fuck back to you, you lazy fuck. I love him too much.”

She took it out his arms, “Don’t take him! He’s my gude!” 

Mako sighed, “Don’t fight, you’re not five year olds.”

Both of them stuck their tongues out at him, but Hana did walk away to purchase the egg man. She came back a moment later and linked arms with Jamie, “But yeah, back to my original point. We should all get to know each other! So, Mako, what are you studying?”

“Psychology.”

“Cool! Are you going to be a psychiatrist or a counselor?”

He shrugged, causing all the small plushies on his shoulders to fall, “Maybe.”

“That’s super cool! I thought about going into that field, but now I’m trying to see if I can become a professional gamer. I started a youtube channel, and it’s doing well, but I think that’s because I’m super cute. So, Jamie, what are you studying?” She elbowed his side. 

He pouted but answered, “Chemistry with a minor in mechanics. I’m going to get a doctorate in chemistry so might as well become a mechanic to help pay for that, you know?”

Hana nodded, apparently pacified with his answer. She looked up to Mako, “He’s super money conscious, I think it’s hilarious. Like, he’s on disability, then he’s in the marching band, and that takes away from tuition, and he’s also on an academic scholarship and he works at starbucks. Like OMG, he’s almost paying for college by himself.”

Jamie smirked, “I’ve already figured it out, FAFSA gives money to students who are married and starting a family, so all I have to do is find someone who is willing to pretend to be married with me, and we can both get free money.”

Mako looked over at him, “Yeah, that’s never going to happen for you, is it.”

He kept beaming, “Nope! I mean, look at me! Not to mention my personality!”

The shortest chuckled awkwardly, “Let’s go get the key copied then we can go get pizza!”

Jamie shrugged, “Kay, can we stop by Cafe Diem along the way?”

A pierced brow was raised once again. “What’s that.”

“It’s this hip cafe I go to when I’m at the mall. They’ve got great things there. Like, boba teas and nuts.” He smirked. 

Mako rolled his eyes, “That meme died the day it was born.”

“Sad, but no, they have cinnamon roasted nuts and tea with little bobas in them. It’s great, Lucio likes it too, doesn’t he?”

Hana nodded, “He’s trying to get a job there, but here’s the thing, hipster’s have such a monopoly on who his hired, he’s never going to get in. I told him to settle for Starbucks and he just about cried.” 

Both of them burst out laughing. 

God, Mako didn’t understand either of them…

They managed to get to the kay copier without too much incident. However, when they got there, there wasn’t too much variety in the colors of keys they could get. 

Jamie seemed to be more upset about that, “No pig! Damn! And I was so looking forward to something cute.”

Hana shrugged, “That just means you can get a plain one and paint it. I hear that nail polish works super well on keys.”

He perked up. “OMG, you know what that means, right!”

She beamed, “It’s manicure time!” 

Just as Mako was once again going to stay in his own lane and not get involved, Jamie looked and arm around his, “Mako! Let us paint you nails too! Pretty please?”

“Are you going to be annoying all evening if I don’t let you?”

“You know it!”

He gave a heavy sigh, “Fine.” It’s not like anyone would challenge his masculinity anyway. He was massive and scary. 

They copied the key and went to go get food. That should have only taken thirty maybe forty minutes more. Instead, it took two hours, and when they finally left the mall, Jamie had a tattoo and an eyebrow piercing, not to mention his boba tea. 

Mako sighed heavily as he got into the driver’s seat of the car, “I looked away for two minutes, how the fuck did you get that mutilated in the time I looked away? Hana, why weren’t you watching your brother?”

“Sheesh mom, it’s not that big of a deal, he’s over eighteen, he can do what he wants.” She took out her phone to take selfies with Jamie and his new eyebrow piercing and three ear piercings. 

Mako pinched the bridge of his nose, “I distinctly remember you saying once upon a time that you refused to get tattoos or piercings or even dye your hair because you wouldn’t be able to keep up with it! You’re going to get infections. God, you're like a twelve year old.”

He sipped at his tea for a thoughtful moment. “Nah, I’m more like a five year but with power. And I know I have this power. And just to clear something up, you looked away for like, half an hour, you were too busy looking at the book bin in the book store. It’s your fault you’re too intellectual.”

He rested his forehead on the steering wheel. “What are your parents going to say?”

“Nothing. They won’t see it until I’m old and dying. I don’t see them face to face anymore, and they have no legal control over me.”

“They could stop sending you money then.”

He pressed his mouth into a line, “Right. You're pretty smart. If that happens, I’ll go back to living on the street, but I’ll get a part time job, and I won’t get into fights since I look punk as hell with this flaming skull on my arm. And then I’ll get a shitty apartment and send you sad letters asking of money or whatever.”

“Your plan for the future is honestly horrifying.”

He shot the other finger guns and a wink, “At least I have a plan. Now let's get home, I want to paint my nails black or something edgy.”

Hana popped her head between the two front seat, “How about dark grey and orange? French tip with inverted ring finger?”

He nodded, “Sounds good. Can we do Mako’s black with pigs, hearts and peaches all over them?”

“Of course!” 

Mako groaned but drove away. God, he hoped that they were just like this when they were together and not separate. Otherwise, Mako would have an awful semester.

Five hours later, Hana had left, and Jamie had finally fallen asleep after putting everything of his away and complaining about the pain from his arm and face. Honestly, why would he even let himself get a tattoo if he knew he had sensitive skin? But despite his eccentricness, he did do a pretty good job on his nails, putting a heart on his pinky, then a skull on his ring, then a peach, then a blank black nail, then a pig. It was cut and badass. Still, he was too high strung. 

But since Hana had left three hours before, he had calmed down quite a bit. Mako decided that it was just Hana that destroyed his self control. 

Mako had finally gotten back to his book and was reading it while sipping at non caffeinated coffee, because he wasn't going to destroy his chance at sleeping. 

Just as he was about to turn the page, someone slammed open the door. 

He looked up, somewhat surprised. There, standing in the doorway was Hanzo. “Hello?”

The other didn’t look too happy, “What’s all this new stuff? Your boyfriend move in?”

“No, not technically.”

Jamie sat up in his bed, apparently having been woken up by everything going on around them. He looked at Hanzo sleepily and blinked. “Nice tits. What's up?

He crossed his arms over his bare pecs, “I could ask you the same thing. What are you doing here, who are you?”

Jamie pulled his head back in disbelief, “Who am I? Who are you?”

Mako stood up, “This is Hanzo, he was my roommate for like, two days. He still has his key, even though he left to go live with his brother.”

“Yeah, well now my brother has a boyfriend, so he kicked me out of his apartment. How does someone younger than me even get an apartment? I’m telling you, his boyfriend is his sugar daddy. No way his gaming channel makes that much. God, he’s so annoying, I just want to kill him.” He took a breath, “Anyway, I’m sure I’m still registered for this room, so what the fuck is this dude doing here?”

Jamie tried to get out of the bed but just ended up on the floor, showing off his midriff, “I’m here to have a one night stand. That’s why I’m in my own bed and sleeping already. What do you think dipstick, I’m your replacement.” He added a wink just for good measure. 

Hanzo sneered at him. 

Mako sighed, “He’s registered to this room too, I can’t get rid of him, I tried. Do you have anywhere else to stay for the night?”

“No! My parents don’t want me back home, and that’s like three hours away, what about him? Can’t you send him packing?”

Jamie had managed to get his leg on and stood up, “I’m not going anywhere. I just got comfortable, and my parents would kill me if they saw the man I have become, even though they should have expected this. But I think I have a solution.”

Hanzo frowned, “The fuck are you talking about? And are you going to suggest sharing a bed? Because no.”

He rolled his eyes and rummaged around for a bit before handing Hanzo a key. “I made copies of my old key, just cause. I know that Jesse doesn’t have a new roommate yet, why don’t you go find him. He loves talking about things like feelings, so go talk to him about your brother’s sugar daddy.” He pat his tattooed shoulder. "Now get the fuck out and let me sleep.” 

He walked back to the bed and got under the covers. 

Hanzo looked honestly so offended, but he did leave. 

Mako shrugged and went back to his book.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> leave a comment! guess what happens next! tell me what you liked! what you disliked! what you want to see next! how i can improve! tell me your favorite desert! please, just talk to me!
> 
> I've decided my new goal is to inspire someone. So if y'all are keeping up, my first goal is get on an ao3 feed, second is get to 30000 words, third is get on a fic list/ yazzdonut donuts fic list, fourth is now to get mentioned by someone as having inspired them. Or just inspire them. :P 
> 
> Tell me if I inspire you.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have a free day. i should clean my room or apply for scholarships. instead im looking at porn and writing fanfiction (in my defense i went to the store today. so.)
> 
> anyway, here's a mchazo chapter. i dont know their character types or antyhing about them. i am flying by the seat of my pant, but when am i not. lol. 
> 
> so, last chapter, i implied that genji had a sugar daddy, i mean that to be zenyatta, but zenyatta is like twenty in cannon, and genji is like, thirty?, so i bs'd the ages and now zenyatta is like, twenty five and a counselor and genji is a nineteen year old youtuber with a sugar daddy. idk. i feel like sugar daddies have to be older that their counterparts. 
> 
> also, i don't know anything about hanzo. he walks around shirtless i dcided, then gets annoyed when people look at his titties(pecs)or tatts. 
> 
> i decided mccree is a gentle southerner who likes dogs and is probably a furry and will never drink an alcohol underage. he also is an amputee i think? it looks like he has a fake arm in all teh pics, maybe that's a fake fake arm, like a gauntlet? well, not anymore! hahahahahah. 
> 
> kill me. ;-;

Hanzo was used to living with his brother. He had lived in the fairly small apartment with his weeb of a brother for quite some time, and he thought he had seen it all: Genji getting a body pillow of a pink haired anime boy, him sitting in the lap of his older friend Zenyatta, and so much more weird crap, like him making cereal by pouring the milk in first. Talk about disgraceful. 

But the thing he didn’t expect when he came home was sex noises. Sex noises was a crude way to describe the moaning and slapping from the other room, but it encompassed the ruckus pretty well. 

Hanzo frowned, he didn’t see any sign of a woman over…

With a frown still present on his worn face, he made his way over to his brother room and knocked…. Or rather, he planned on knocking. The door was already wide open. 

There on the master bed with the body pillow pushed off on the floor, was his dear younger brother and Zenyatta, just going at it. 

“What in the hell!” He didn’t mean to yell, but it was the first thing to come to mind. 

He got a pillow thrown at him “Oh my god! What the fuck are you doing in here!” 

“What are you doing! The age difference is so much!”

“Ohh my god get out! Get out!” 

“Fine! I’ll leave!” He stormed out of the bedroom, not at all satisfied with the conversation he had try to have with his brother. With a disgruntled grunt, he packed a bag and left the house. Of course, that probably wasn’t what his brother meant by saying get out, but it’s what he did. 

At the end of the night, he had seen gay sex, gotten yelled at by an amputee who had stolen his bed, and was now going to have to try to worm his way into another man’s room for the night. God, this was all so stupid. 

He knocked on the door indtead of just opening it with the key he was given. 

A man missing half of his left arm opened the door. He let his gaze lazily drift over the other’s form, appearing to appreciate his shirtlessness as well.

Okay, the shirtlessness wasn’t Hanzo’s fault, he had gotten home from the gym, so he wasn’t wearing a shirt when he stormed out. 

Hanzo crossed his arms over his chest, partially obscuring his tattoos, “Hi, do you know Jamie?”

His accent was thick when he spoke, “Jamie? Haven’t heard that name in years?” He stuck a cigarette between his lips and lit it up. 

He scrunched up his nose, “Really? He said he was your roommate not too long ago.”

He stared blankly for a moment. “Yeah. He was. It--it was a joke, ya see? Never mind. Name’s Jesse, can I help you?” His accent died down a bit as he stuck out his hand. 

Hanzo hesitated but shook his head. “I’m Hanzo, and I got kicked out of my dorm by that punk.”

Jesse gave a low whistle, somehow managing to do such around his cigarette. “I feel you. He can be like that. Did he send you over here to try to bunk here or kick me out of here?”

He shrugged, “Something like that.” 

He nodded, “Well then, come on in, partner.” He stepped inside the room after flicking away his cigarette, beckoning Hanzo to follow. 

He stepped inside as well, taking things in. The dorm was fairly clean, though a couple things lay thrown around, including an arm, and half the room looked ransacked. 

Jesse sighed softly, “Sorry for the mess. Jamison got all his stuff just today, so it’s a bit of a mess, and I don’t know where the original sheets for the bed are. So. I don't know if I can supply a place for you to sleep unless you want to share a bed with me. I mean, I’m not suggesting that, I can probably help you pay for a motel room for the night, you know, something to tie you over until the morning. 

He mirrored his sigh, though his was much more grief ridden. “No, you don't have to go through that much trouble.”

“If you say so. But I’m willing to help in anyway, I’m just sorry you got kicked out…” He pulled a can of soda out of a nearby mini fridge and tossed it at Hanzo with no warning before grabbing his own. 

Of course, the soda hit him in the side of the head. He winced and picked it up. 

Jesse continued talking, “He said his moving dorms was sanctioned, and I’m pretty sure it was into a room with someone he knew, because let me tell you, the college is not really nice with people like us. If you have a disability, you better bet you’re stuck with other people who have a disability. But whatever. I’m just saying, how could he kick you out if the school let him move in?”

He sat down on the bare bed and opened his can. Of course, it fizzed over. He sighed. “I’m still listed under that room, but I moved into my brother’s apartment, because hey, if I can get my own room and have access to a kitchen, I’m going to do it. But I found out that my brother is gay and he has a good apartment despite being a nineteen punk by having a sugar daddy.” He pulled a face as he spoke. 

Jesse pulled a face as well, “You have something against gay people?”

He shrugged. “Not usually, but I mean. It’s my little bro, you know? And our parents are super anti-gay, but they like him better than me, so it kind of pisses me off that he can be against what we were raised to be and still get all their love.”

“You know, he didn’t choose to be gay. He probably feels shame because of how strictly he was brought up. He can’t change who he is, but he was raised to hate people like him. It’s a sad existence and can really take a toll on someone’s psyche. You’re probably only making it worse by rejecting him and moving out. He trusted you enough to come out to you.”

He paused, “No. He didn’t come out. I found him having gross sex with an older man and he yelled at me to leave, so I left.”

Jesse sighed and put a hand to the bridge of his nose. “God, you pretty li'l idiot. He probably meant get out of the room, not leave forever. And that just further proves my point that he isn’t comfortable with his identity yet.”

“Whatever.” he took a sip of his soda now that it had calmed down. Root beer. “Why are you even lecturing me on gay stuff?”

“Cause I’m hella gay. But whatever. I think I’ll go to sleep soon, any idea what you’re going to do? Go back to your brother and apologize maybe?”

“No. I’m staying here. I’m too tired to keep going around, and it’s getting cold outside, my nipples get hard.”

Jesse laughed, “Stop your pouting. You can stay, not sure how comfortable it will be though, without sheets or a blanket. You might get cold here and then what will your nipples do? It would be better if you had a shirt though.”

A light blush arose in Hanzo’s cheeks. “I didn’t bring a shirt. I honestly sleep shirtless.”

The other laughed again, “You really like being shirtless, huh? Makes sense, considering you have a nice body. Anyway, I’ll lend you a shirt if you’d like, and I can spare a blanket probably. But still, it might not be comfortable.”

“At least you’re keeping me for the night.”

“Of course, li’l pup.”

Hanzo wasn't sure what that meant, but it sure did make him blush. Despite the warmth in his face, he could still try to uphold his image. “I don’t know what you mean by that.”

“Just that you seem like a stray wandering around from place to place, begging with puppy dog eyes for a warm place to stay and a bowl of kibble. Well, I’m saying I ain’t one to turn a stray or someone in need away.”

He huffed and re-crossed his arms, “I’m not as pathetic as a dog.”

“Sure do look like it. Anyway, I’m going to head to bed.”

He nodded, “I’m going to use your shower if that’s okay.”

Jesse nodded. “Go ahead, li’l pup.”

Hanzo left to shower. Once he came back into the main part of the dorm room, this time wearing sweatpants, still no shirt, Jesse was out cold. With a soft sigh, he too went to bed. He sat on the bare bed--previously bare bed. Now there was a blanket. 

It certainly was cold, but he could handle it. 

The next morning he found himself in the arms of Jesse, his face just inches apart from the other man’s. 

He would have leapt out of bed…. But it was comfortable, and was comfortable and warm. He let his eyes close again as a soft smile overtook his face. 

Half an hour later, Jesse woke up, “Ey, whatchu doin’ in my bed?”

Hanzo re-woke up, “What? You’re the one who picked me up.”

“Yeah, how? With my two arms that I have? Cause that didn’t happen. You crawled in here last night, not that I’m complaining. You’re cute up close.” 

He blushed. After a moment, he recovered. “Gross. No homo.”

“Full homo.”

He blushed harder and squirmed out of the bed. “Well, thanks for letting me stay the night.”

“‘Course. You’re welcome anytime, li’l pup. Hope things work out with you and your brother.”

“I’m not someone you can just booty call like that. See-ya.” He left the dorm as fast as he could, with the intention of never going back. 

He was back an hour later blushing, “Can I stay here? Turns out my brother is pretty mad.”

Jesse smiled, “Course. I told you, if you need a place to stay, I’m your huckleberry. Come on in. I hope you brought sheets, unless you want to share a bed again.” He winked again before chuckling.

“Are-are you flirting with me?”

He shrugged. “It’s weird how people find out your gay and suddenly everything is flirting. Nah, I ain’t flirting with you, I’m pulling your leg.”

“Oh.” He tried his best to not sound disappointed. 

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll keep off the flirting. I’m not going to go after a man who’s not interested. I did one time, and it didn’t work out. He just wanted a one night stand. But whatever, I’m making this about me.”

Hanzo shrugged. “That’s fine. You’re letting me live here, you can make it about anything you want.”

He shrugged as well, “I don’t want to make it about me. Bottom line, I won’t flirt with you.”

Without thinking, he responded, “Maybe I’ll have to start flirting with you then.”

Jesse paused for a moment then chuckled. “Really, didn’t take you to be the type that’s into men.”

Hanzo was silent for a moment as redness filled his face. “I-” He had no excuse. 

He didn’t need one. Jesse held up his hand, “It’s fie. You figure yourself out. In the meantime, do you need help moving things?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idk what im doing. 
> 
> i was once homophobic. my adventures through sexualizing yaoi, then deciding that yuri was okay because equality, lead me to the realization that i am hella gay. that, and i saw a pretty girl. hot dam was she pretty. so. before you call out hanzo, call out me. please just do it. i deserve to be beaten up over the internet. 
> 
> idk if this was shippy enough. this will come back later tho. 
> 
> also, fuck fifteen chapters. this is continuing. i am screaming. i dont know what i am doing.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't have anything going on today???? weird for a saturday. so i'm writing. this chaptr alludes to something i want to write, but haven't found the place to write it in. 
> 
> siiigh. let's see if I can squeeze another chapter out. 
> 
> also, shout out to guestuser6, (i know that's not ur real name) for commenting on this fic. honestly, i love attention and validation, and getting their comment made me stop having an attack of sorts. so. yeah, 
> 
> i know that might not be fair to everyone because i probably would have gotten more comments had i left more time between chp 15 and chp 16. but.

Mako learned quite a bit about Jamie in the following week leading up to the new term. Like how Jamie was more self sufficient now. Well, he always was self sufficient, especially considering he had lived on the streets alone at one point, but now he seemed less clingy. 

And he seemed a lot healthier. He ate more and smiled more than he did three years ago. 

He just seemed like a better person. Honestly, Mako was kind of liking the person Jamie turned out to be, or he did until Hana came over for the third time since Jamie moved in. She was always over it seemed, especially since the only thing she had to do was a few online classes and keep up her gaming youtube channel. So she was over a lot. 

She sat perched on Jamie’s bed, cuddling one of Mako’s Pachimari’s. She didn’t even ask to hold it. “So, Jamie, you gonna do marching band again this term?”

“Hell yeah.” He didn’t even skip a beat, he just kept poking at his tattoo and hissing in pain. 

Mako raised a pierced brow as he reached over to swat Jamie’s hand away. “Marching band?”

Hana nodded enthusiastically, “Yeah! You didn’t know? He plays percussion in the marching band. It’s kind of funny to see him carry the bass drum around.”

He snorted, “Wow. Lame. Didn’t take you to be a band geek.”

“It’s pretty lame, but still brutal. I have to carry that heavy ass stuff in a stiff uniform while marching in perfect unison in shapes no less. Well, we aren’t up to shapes. That’s more in the last part of the spring term. Still, all that, and playing a song from memory in the heat. It’s brutal. But damn does it help with tuition.” He continued to poke at his tattoo. 

“Fine, it’s brutal. Just didn’t know that about you.” Mako grabbed his hand, “You’re going to give yourself an infection. Isn’t this why you didn’t want a tattoo in the first place? You have to take care of them for a couple weeks.” At least he had gotten I'd 

He groaned, “Fine, I’ll go put antibacterial shit on it to counteract the germs from my hand. Happy?”

“Yes. Put a bandage on it too.”

He groaned but got up and walked to the bathroom. 

Hana smiled and turned to Mako who was still on the floor. “Soooo, what do you think about Jamie?”

“What does that mean? I’m not into him if that’s what you mean. He kind of ruined that experience for me.”

“Nah, not about that. Just about him as a person.”

“Oh.” He shrugged, “He’s fine. He’s gotten a lot better since three years ago, like he’s all happy and healthy. Lot less clingy, that’s for sure.”

She gave a soft sigh, “Poor, sweet, naive Mako. So young, so naive, too pure for this world really.”

He paused, “You do realize I look like I have killed a man. I can dead lift two hundred pounds.”

She got off the bed, her legs unfolding from beneath her gracefully. She walked over to him and pat his head, “Yeah, but you’re still so naive. Jamie’s just a big lying piece of shit. Just like me. Like yeah, he’s better. He’s trying and he has coping mechanisms or whatever, but he’s still just as sick and clingy and everything else.”

He swiped her hand away. “I think you have some issues with your brother. You’re constantly looking for issues in other people so that your issues aren’t brought to light, and your brother is the perfect person for you to bring up problems with because he is ill. But he’s getting better, so why don’t you just leave it at that and look inside yourself and look at your own problems.”

She shrugged, “I may have problems, but I’m not lying or making up things about Jamie to get the focus off of me.”

Mako rolled his eyes. “I’m getting a degree in psychology, and you really think I believe your word over my experience. He’s fine, he’s getting better on his own. I haven’t seen anything too bad, and nothing as bad as it was years ago.”

“Really? Have you considered that maybe he’s hiding things from you because you aren’t close to him? Like, it might not even be conscious. If he’s close to you, he’ll be clingy, he’ll tell you when he’s paranoid, he’ll tell you that or at least show it. But now, you’re just another face, one he probably thinks is in cahoots with everyone else.”

“That’s bull shit Hana. If he’s still so bad, why haven’t you done anything?”

She shrugged, “I don’t want to be on his bad side. And he is getting better. And, I still think he’d listen to you a lot more than me. Did you see how he listened to you about picking at his tattoo? If that were me, he’d stick his tongue out at me and tell me to fuck off. But that’s besides the point, just keep your eyes peeled, maybe get closer to him, and you’ll see what I’m talking about.”

Jamie came back out of the bathroom, “Hey, sorry for taking so long, I got a call, decided to take it.”

Hana pulled a face, “In the bathroom?”

“It was quiet in there, I could here you guys talking about something, besides, it’s not like I was pissing or something, I was putting ointment on my arm. Anyway, Mako,” He pointed at the man. “Wanna go on a date.”

Hana squealed. 

Makos’ brows furrowed, “Excuse me?”

“It ain’t like I’m hitting on you or anything. Jesse called and he wants to go on a double date, probably to rub his cute new boy toy in my face, as if I care. Anyway, it’s not like I’m chummy with anyone else on campus. What do you say?”

He hesitated. “I’m not sure I want to go on a date.”

“I already said it won’t be like I’m hitting on you. Besides, I’ll pay. And I’m sure you can play the part great. I mean, you already have experience. I’ll do anything to get you to do this. Please! I already told him I’d bring someone, and I can’t just show up empty handed. Pleeease!”

He sighed heavily, “You know what, fine. But this honestly seems too out of place and sudden. Like a plot device that isn't thoroughly thought out.”

“Thank you Mako. We’re supposed to meet him and his boy toy at Toni’s tomorrow for dinner.” He practically skipped (hobbled) over and kissed the top of Mako’s head, much to his dismay. 

Hana squealed again and clapped her hands together rapidly, reminding everyone that she was in fact, still present.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for my author notes not making sense. im still groggy from my medication and still in a weird place mentally from having an attack. (idk if it was anxiety or paranoia) anyway. yeah!
> 
> next chapter is fake bf chapter mixed with more mchanzo, that i dont know how to write. :)))))) i want jesse and mako to fight over who knows jamie the best and hanzo being a weird angsty boy b/c hes into boys. meanwhile, jamie's just there eating his food.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another cheap plot ahead. i'm giving up. on life and everything. just. take it. let me rest. 
> 
> three chapters in two days. i'm barely managing to stay with my word count.

A little over twenty four hours after Mako had been roped into the situation, he was sitting int the italian restaurant, feeling rather uncomfortable. Jamie and he were the first ones to show up. So they were sitting at the table, the smaller currently shoving bread into his mouth like he was starving. 

Jesse and Hanzo walked in a couple minutes later, Hanzo with a shirt on this time, though it was unbuttoned quite a bit, and Jesse with a bolo tie. Mako couldn’t decide if the bolo was ironic or not. He didn’t comment on it. 

Hanzo scoffed at Jamie and took a bread stick for himself. 

Jesse just smiled and turned his attention to Mako. “So, you’re dating Jamie, huh? I tried that once, didn’t work out. How’d you two meet?”

Mako wanted to raise a brow his tone but didn’t, seeing as it was friendly enough. “You mean aside from him being my roommate?”

“Yes, aside from that. I’m assuming you met somewhere before seeing as he talked so fondly of you before he moved out.” He hadn’t really, but Jesse didn't have to disclose that.

“Oh, that. We went to high school together. So, we’ve known each other for three or four years?” 

Jamie vaguely shrugged as if to confirm it. 

Jesse nodded, “So you’re pretty close with him?”

“Yeah.”

“Cool. I room with him for all three years until last week, so I guess I know how you feel.”

“Yeah.” There was definitely something in his tone that unnerved him. 

Jamie looked over at Jesse, “Yeah, we were tiiight. But you know what, I bet you’ll get along even better with this jackass over here. Sorry, jackass, forgot your name.”

Hanzo scoffed, “It’s fine. I don’t want someone of your likes to utter my name.”

“What does someone of my likes even mean?”

He shut his mouth, 

Jesse put an arm around his partner’s shoulders, “Don’t mind him, Jamie. You both just have that kind of personality. I bet you’ll clash heads until you die.”

Hanzo shrugged his arm off, “Yeah, somehow I think I’ll be okay with not getting along with him. I’m going to the bathroom, you can go ahead and order for me, I’m not picky.” He got up and left. 

When he got back, both Mako and Jesse were yelling. 

Hanzo sat down and gave a lost look to Jamie. “What happened?” 

He shrugged, bread stick in hand. “We ordered you pumpkin ravioli. It’s supposed to be limited time, but they didn’t get rid of it before the holidays were over, so it’s still the special. Really good though.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about idiot.”

He stuck his tongue out before speaking, “They’re fighting about me, isn’t it obvious.” He gestured to his body as if it were appealing. 

He rolled his dark eyes, “As if.”

“No really, Jesse really had a thing for me, and I had a thing for him for a short while. And now I’m with Mako,” He shrugged, “Just listen to them.”

He sighed but did momentarily turn his attention to the two arguing men.

“Well, I’ve met his parents.” Mako was practically growling. 

“That’s not fair, you were in high school, you had to meet his parents.”

“Yeah, well, they were okay with us having sex.”

“I bet it was vanilla as hell. I know pretty much all of his kinks.”

“Well, that didn’t help you keep him, now did it?”

Jamie grabbed Mako’s arm, “Hey, babe, calm down. Same for you Jesse, you can’t really compare experiences, you feel?”

“That’s not going to stop me.”

“Well, then at least stop for your date. How do you think this makes him feel. You’re dwelling on the past instead of thinking about the future,” He gestured to Hanzo who was sitting there, eating his breadsticks, cause damn that was good bread. 

Jesse sighed and sat back down, seeing as sometime during the fight he had stood up. “Sorry Hanzo.”

He shrugged, “You do whatever you want to do. I don’t really have a say in that. Besides, I’m not too upset about you being upset over an ex. After all, we’re not really serious. I’m not gay after all.”

He pat his upper arm, “Sure, okay. Sorry anyway.”

Soon after he apologized, the food arrived.

Jamie pushed his plate towards Mako, “I filled up on the bread sticks.”

Hanzo frowned and looked at the breadbasket. Only about five were missing, and he had eaten two. Maybe the basket was replaced when he was in the bathroom? He shrugged the thought away and ate his ravioli. It was pretty good, but he’d prefer gnocchi over it anyday. 

There were no more fights for the rest of the dinner. Almost an hour and a half later, Mako left with Jamie draped across his arm. 

They got onto Mako’s hog, still with Jamie’s arms draped around the man’s middle, though they didn’t have to act anymore. He was still physically clingy when they walked to the dorm. 

The taller stopped short of the door with a sigh, forcing the other to stop as well, “Why are you so affectionate? We’re alone?”

“Maybe I’m affectionate because we’re alone.” He smirked, the cheeky bastard. 

“What do you even mean.”

He pressed his cheek into the other’s upper arm, “You still like me don’t you, even if just a little bit. You got all defensive about how well you knew me. You liiiike me.”

He blushed and pushed him off, “Well, you like me. You think I’m daddy material. Yeah, I heard you talking with Hana.”

He stuck out his tongue, “Whatever. You don’t seem to be denying it. The daddy material part of the liking part. I'll get you one of these days Mako, when we’re both feeling it.”

“Wait, you’re not feeling it?”

He held up his hands, "Don’t get me wrong. You’re insanely attractive, my type and all that. And I think we covered this, there’s some remaining emotions from our time dating, especially since there was nothing wrong with our relationship when I broke it off. But I ain’t looking for a relationship right now. More like quick lays, little flings that don’t mean anything and one night stands. It’s college, you know? I want to have fun, not be an adult and looks for someone, or pretend to be an adult like we all did in highschool.”

Mako sighed and opened the door to the dorm. To his surprise, though it really shouldn’t have been surprising, Hana was in the dorm. 

She walked up to them. “Sooo, how was it! Did you fall in love?”

Jamie chuckled and walked in, “No, not yet. Did you come all the way down here just to ask that?”

Mako stepped in, “How did you get in here?”

She giggled at him, “I made a copy of your key for myself. Anyway, that’s not the only reason I came down here, though I’ll admit that that is the main reason I came down here. But, mom wants to see you. She wanted to come up here, but I told her you were on a date, and that I would come up here to tell you to come visit over the weekend. So, you’re welcome, I gave you sufficient warning.”

He grinned, “Yeah, thanks. You’re a great sister. Ey, Mako, you want to go back to the suburbs this weekend?”

He groaned, “Classes start in a couple days.”

“That’s not an answer, wanna go?”

“I just want to shower.”

Jamie shrugged, “I’ll work on getting him to go with me. If he doesn’t want to go, then I guess you’ll have to come get me. But you can tell mom I’ll come visit.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i had some witty shit to post, but man. i jsut want to sleep. let me skype my friend and we'll see. comment!


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today is just a god awful day. idk. i can't talk about it, but i'm humiliated, and hated, and ashamed, and probably a bit paranoid. It really took everything I had to finish this chapter, even though I had written most of it with vigour. I'm just dying inside and nobody loves me. Well, Laura does, hopefully this other cute girl too. ;) god, i'm gay. 
> 
> I'm like, forty five words off of reaching 36000 words, or at least I was. Maybe I'm closer now since this site makes me separate some words. 
> 
> But here yougo, a couple cute people asked for more. they really motivate me, especially since they took the time out of their day to ay they liked the story and want to see me continue.

The next morning, Jamie came out of the bathroom dressed in torn, baggy cargo pants and his infamous marijuana hoodie. It looked perfectly fine, in fact, it seemed to match Mako’s camo hoodie and black jeans. Still, the normalcy of it was somewhat shocking. 

Usually, the blond walked around in crop tops that said, ‘Daddy’ or in neon green short shorts while not even bothering with a top. He didn’t seem to like wearing clothes, that or he loved to show off his weirdly pale, bony body. He didn’t look as bad as Mako had remembered, but still, he could see a lot of his ribs, and all his vertebrae, not to mention his sharp hip bones poking over the waist of his pants. Jamie was still thin, and he seemed to take pride in that. 

Mako easily shrugged the idea off, figuring he was more dressed up for the cold. It wasn’t really that cold outside, but when you were driving at seventy plus miles and hour with nothing between you and the elements, it got rather cold. 

He didn’t say anything, he just lead him out to the motorcycle. 

Soon enough, they were on their way to the suburbs, Jamie on the back of the bike and clinging tightly to the larger man in front of him. 

Mako could feel his skinny arms jab him in the gut through the whole ride, even with both of their hoodies acting as a buffer. But it was fine. He eventually dropped him off in front of the white picket fence house, that now had several multi colored rose bushes, and went home himself to see his mother. 

Honestly, he though he had seen the last of Jamie for the weekend, and welcomed the break. However, it wasn’t even two hours before he saw the thin man again. 

He opened the door to his bedroom to settle down for the night and see his guinea pig. Instead, he found Jamison sitting on his bed with his knees drawn and the little piggy in his hands. 

As he heard the door open, he looked up, “Hi. I let myself in, hope you don’t mind.”

Mako stared blankly for a moment, as if trying to process what was going on. “How the hell did you get here?” He knew for a fact that the front door hadn’t been opened. 

He shrugged lightly, “I crawled through the window. Reminds me of the good old days when we’d sneak out to cuddle underneath the stars and spray paint the town with dicks.”

“Yeah.” He took Pachimari from his slightly shaking hands and deposited her back in her cage. “Do you think are tags or whatever are still there?”

He shook his head, “No, probably not.” He started to pick at the orange paint of his bionic hand when the small animal wasn’t occupying his fingers. 

Mako sat down on the edge of the bed, a bit away from Jamie. “Yeah, there are a lot of edgy teens in this area. Speaking of edgy teens, do you still do graffiti?”

He scoffed, “Not usually. That’s for edgy kids in love. I don’t have the time nor will power. It is still interesting to me though.”

He nodded as the room fell silent. 

After a moment, Jamie scooted over on the bed and rested his head on Mako’s large shoulder. “You haven’t asked why I’m here.”

“I figured you wouldn’t want to talk about it.” He paused before deciding to throw him a conversational bone, “Did you get kicked out of the house for getting a tattoo? Especially one as emo and edgy as the one you got.”

“No. My parents still don’t know, and I’m not letting them know till I’m living comfortably on my own. And it’s not too edgy. It’s perfect for if I ever join a biker gang or become a stripper. That, or people will just assume I’ve done one of those things.”

“Still can’t believe you didn’t choose your lil smiley face tag to get tattooed onto your body.”

Jamie was silent for a moment before smiling, “I didn’t realize you could do personalized tattoos. I just chose one from the book. Well, next time…” He trailed off as his smile slowly fell. 

Silence overtook the room again as he went back to picking at the paint, his head still resting softly on Mako’s shoulder. 

With a sigh, Mako threw him yet another bone. He just really looked like he needed someone to talk to, okay? “So, how did you get kicked out of the house?”

He gave a soft sigh of his own, “I didn’t really get kicked out. I kind of just took off. I don’t want to be at home right now, and I didn’t think that there was anyway I’d be able to convince you to drive me back up to the university…”

“Nope, not driving this late at light. What even happened to get you to run away from your house?”

He shrugged softly. It was another couple of seconds before he spoke again. “I had a fight with Angela, I mean, it’s probably my fault. But she just doesn’t trust me and it pisses me the fuck off.”

“Oh yeah? What happened?”

Another pause. “I don’t know how much you know about my home life, or even how much you want to know… but I kind of feel it’s important to know the story.” 

Mako smirked despite himself, “I think I know a lot more than anyone else you’ve dated recently.”

He lifted his head to stick out his tongue at the taller before resting against him once again. “Anyway, you know how I send pics of my weight to my mom everyday cause she’s worried I’ll relapse and start losing weight and all that? Well, she saw me eat and she STILL wanted to see me weigh myself.

That pissed me off, you know, cause I ate my food in front of her. And honestly, if I had skipped breakfast or lunch, which I didn’t, then really, how much would my weight differ from today and yesterday, or tomorrow and today? I told her I ate, she watched me eat, and she can see me in person to see that I’m healthy. But she still thinks that I’m cheating somehow.”

Mako shrugged, causing Jamie’s head to bob with his shoulders. “Well, you kind of are cheating. Maybe she could tell from the hollowness in your face.”

“I am not cheating. I am eating perfectly healthy. And my face isn’t hollow. I just have naturally prominent cheek bones.” He crossed his arms tightly, finally leaving the pain on his hand alone. 

“Jamie. I know your bathroom scale isn’t, well, to scale. You changed it by twenty pounds. It’s pretty obvious. I’ve tested it. You’re also insanely skinny anyway. You might not be losing any weight, but I think you still might be underweight. Your mother is a nurse, right? She probably could see that now that she’s looking for those signs. And you storming out probably confirmed her suspicion.”

He didn’t reply. 

Mako sighed, “Why do you even do this to yourself? Being this weight can’t be good for your health.”

He shrugged, “I can’t imagine anything I do is good for my health, the smoking, the weed, the drinking, the sex. But I do it anyway.”

“Okay, but we’re not talking about that right now. Why do you let your body be like this, Jamie.”

He wrinkled up his nose. “I don’t know. I’ve always been this size. Even if I weren’t mentally ill, I’m used to this, and I see any other weight on me as fat or unnecessary.”

“Oh.” It was Mako’s turn to be silent. He still spoke after a moment though. “Do you think I’m fat or unnecessary?”

“What? No, mate. You’re gorgeous, just the way you are. I’ve always thought that.”

“But you said--” He was abruptly cut off. 

“I know what I said, but that doesn’t mean shit. My opinions can change from person to person. On me, I feel disgusting above this weight. For you, I see you as perfect. You’re beautiful.”

A pregnant pause overtook the room, hanging heavy in any open spaces. 

It was Jamie who broke it this time. “You know that I still love you right? I think I already said this, but I do. I never stopped loving you. I just left because it was convenient, not because I felt nothing. Those feelings still haven’t gone away. You're still as radiant as the day I fell in love with you…”

Mako sighed and moved to lie down on the bed, effectively making Jamie fall, seeing as he was leaning so heavily on him before. He quickly righted himself though, nestling into Mako’s side as he did. 

He sighed as the smaller man burrowed into him, then spoke. “I don’t think you love me. I think you’re infatuated with me.”

“Is there a difference?”

“Yeah. You see me as perfect, not as someone with flaws that you accept.”

He gave a small shrug. “Does that even matter?”

“Yeah. Infatuation is ingeuine, and it doesn't last. I don’t want those sort of feelings from you.”

A frown took over his face again. Well, he was already frowning a lot, but it was more of a passive frown, rather than an upset one. “Do you even want any feelings from me?”

“I don’t know. Maybe not, you were kind of a jerk when you left… why are you even bringing this up? I thought you didn’t give a rat’s ass about relationships.”

Another shrug. “I don’t know. I think there’s something about being back home, being with you, and all that. I mean, I’m climbing up to your window like Romeo or some shit again. I can’t help but remember those good old days before life was shit and I had you.”

Mako hesitated, “Is your life shitty now?”

Jamie mirrored his hesitation, “I guess not. But, I look back and it seemed a lot better before. Maybe that’s because memories change each time you remember them. I miss being happy with you.”

“Yeah, well you’re the one who fucked that up. And I’m not willing to take you back yet.”

He pouted, “But, Mako. You already like me, I thought we went over this.”

“Yeah, but you’re still kind of a shitty person, and I’m not over what you’ve done. You really need to fix yourself before you’re ready to be in a relationship.”

A huff passed his lips before he pressed his face into the other one’s arm. “Maybe. Can we stop talking about it now? I am not really in the mood to discuss my self redemption.”

“Fine.” He let silence take over the room for the umpteenth time, this time not bothering to break it. No, he just remained lying down with the other snuggled up against him.

In all honesty, it wasn’t that bad… he almost enjoyed it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gentle reminder, i love comments. They maek me less dead inside. 
> 
> Join us next time to see what will happen next. probably a fist fight r drawings, or gay. yeah. -_-


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ye boyy. this is a fanfiction heavy in description. I trieed making them poetic a to fill up my word count. it workd. ;;;)))) you canskip over all the descriptions and just read the dialogue, but I feel like you'll lose out on a lot, like the window into poor lil jamison's mind. 
> 
> loll. my arm hurts? idk why, it's making me worried. but that aside, i got my life together! all thanks to the amazing peopel who comment with such nice words and give me hope and motivation. I truly appreciate it, and I love you all. I really love it. 
> 
> I'm not crying, you are.

“Jamie, can you please just pick up your clothes? They’re all over the place.” Mako was currently trying to pick up the dorm room. It was a couple days after classes had started up again, and the dorm had gotten a lot dirtier since the first day. Most of it was Jamie’s.

The man in question scoffed, “Yeah, well, you see. I don’t really feel like cleaning up.”

He gave an irritated huff, “Just pick up your god damn clothes. It’s not that hard, seriously. I’m so sick of the way this place looks.”

“Oh, so the mess is bugging you?”

“Yes.” 

He stared at him for a moment, an almost vacant look parading in his hazel eyes. After a moment, still staring straight at Mako, he kicked a pile of books and papers off of his bed. They landed on the floor with a thump and scattered everywhere. 

Mako stared back at him, clenching his jaw in an angry silence. After he mentally counted to ten, he spoke, “Are you going to pick those up?”

“Make. Me.” He enunciated each sound clearly, well he exaggerated them really.

“Fine.” He took the few steps it took to get to Jamie’s bed. With that, he hit him in the mouth. Just a short quick blow, though it didn’t help that his fist was massive and he had rings on. 

He knew he’d leave a mark. What he wasn’t expecting was for Jamie to topple out of the bed from the impact. He was up on his feet soon enough, and lunging towards Mako. 

Honestly, it was hard to determine exactly what had happened, but it was easy to see that it wasn't pretty. 

They managed to fight all over the room,even knocking over a bookshelf at one point. 

In the end, it was Jamie who tore away from the other with a snarl. “I don’t fucking need this,” He practically spat, venom lacing his words quite obviously. He grabbed his phone off of the floor where it had fallen and left. He made sure to slam the door loudly too. 

Mako was alone, alone in his mess. Or rather, their mess, though it didn’t quite feel that way to him. Yes, they both shared an equal amount of blame in making such a mess, but he had been the one trying to clean it up in the first place. In his mind, the weight of the blame fell heavier on him than himself. 

With a heavy sigh, he kneeled down to start picking up and putting back together the room. Surely this would take hours. 

It really did, or rather, it had been two hours before Mako stopped. No, he didn’t stop to grab food or do anything he should have done. No, instead, he sat back and eyed a sketchbook a foot away from him. 

The cover was black and unmarked unlike the rest of Jamie’s notebooks, which still were in a pile near the bed, probably all bent out of shape and maybe torn. 

Speaking of ripped, the book in question was lying open on it’s face, a couple pages obviously torn halfway off.

With a tiny sigh of remorse, he picked up the black book, turning it over as he did. It was just like he remembered, the pages, though torn and bend and all manner of destroyed, the pages were filled with faces. Some were recognizable, like the blond barista that worked at the Starbuck’s with Jamie, or the large man who worked in the library. 

His dark eyes travelled down the the corner of the page to see the date. Several weeks ago. 

He turned the page. More faces, some profile, some not. It was just a repeat of faces. Probably the faces Jamie saw everyday. Jesse managed to make it into this one, but the eyes were looking at the viewer, showing he knew what Jamie was doing and posing. 

Mako rolled his eyes and turned the page. There, almost ripped in half and dated to be last month, the day before Jamie left, was a full body of Jesse, again, posing, and this time shirtless. 

The next page went back to the norm, filled with sketchy faces, only a few of them with shading, if that.

He kept turning, noticing that he managed to get into a few pages. It was still mostly the few people that had always been there, just different expressions. Though, there was Mako in one of those pages, looking pissed. And on the next one, he had his glasses on, looking peaceful. Then him blushing with his nails painted.

Mako, couldn’t help but notice, that the dates on the paper did not, in fact, correspond with any day where anything particular happened, unlike how Hanzo’s one and only appearance so far matched up with the day he barged into their dorm. 

He kept turning the pages, too absorbed in his find to really care about invading privacy. 

There was a page with familiar faces. It took a moment of staring at the quick lines, but he eventually could make out Gabriel and Amelia. They looked wrong though, like they were trapped in high school with slightly wrong faces. It was probably the first time in years that they appeared in one of Jamie’s sketchbooks. 

He glanced at the date, yep, one day before they were due to going back to the suburbs. He probably drew them in anticipation. It’s a shame that he still didn’t reconnect with those two, even after going home. 

The next page wasn’t even a page from the sketch book. It was just printer paper folded over several times before being unfolded and stuck haphazardly in the book. It did have a date--or what was supposed to be a date, though it was too hard to read--like the rest of them, but not really any drawings. The first half was dark, heavy scribbles made with a ballpoint pen, a couple spots smeared as if someone had dropped water on them. 

Then came the writing. The rest of it was filled with the words, ‘I’m okay’ over and over again, starting out really illegible and running together, then finally returning to Jamie’s almost neat print. 

Frowning, Mako turned the page over, there was a more legible date. The day they went back to the suburbs, Under That was a couple drawings of Pachimari in her cage, then out in someone’s lap. One drawing just stopped in the middle. 

He kept on turning, the same faces appeared again, apparently going back to the norm. At this point, it was all normal. Even Jamie were to draw someone completely naked in his sketchbook, Mako would glance at it before continuing without pausing. Nothing could really surprise him, not after the last couple of pages. He honestly thought that he had an understanding of how the sketches worked now. 

He turned the page and stopped dead in his tracks. Out of everything he was expecting, he really was not expecting this. 

An entire page dedicated to him. Previously, he had only appeared half of the time, and all of those sketches seemed like an afterthought. 

But not on this page. Tenderly, Mako began to trace the faint and dark lines with a finger, absorbing all the details as he did.

Honestly, it was amazing. Jamie had managed to capture a better looking version of him without skipping out on anything. The small scar under his eye was there, the chip in his tooth, his drooping chin. It was clearly him, but somehow better. 

His hand inched to the top of the page and grabbed the corner. He was tempted to tear it out. And do what with it, he didn’t know. At the moment, he was debating between tearing it up or framing it, or just keeping it in his pocket. That is, of course, if he did tear out the page that wasn’t his. 

Before he could make up his mind, Jamie walked in. He was over by Mako and crawling into his lap within seconds. The smell of cheap booze and tobacco smoke clung to him lightly. 

He leaned his head on Mako’s chest, “Whatcha got there?”

“You’re rather touchy today, aren’t you.” He didn’t answer him. No instead he deflected and closed the sketchbook. 

“Yeah, maybe.” He reached over and picked up the dropped book. With that, he started flipping through it, just as Mako did moments ago. “Aw, it got torn. Oh well.” He peered up at the taller with his unfocused hazel eyes. “Did you look through this.”

“Maybe. Look. you’re very clearly tipsy, why don’t you go to bed,” He tried to grab the book out of his thin hands, as if that would cover up his embarrassment from looking through someone else’s property. 

He held it away from him with his insanely long arms. “No, not yet. How much did you see?” Despite that being confrontational question, his tone was more curious than anything, though that was probably a result of him being tipsy. 

“Does it matter?” He kept grabbing for the black book. 

“Yeah. I wanna know if you saw the pictures of you.” still holding the item away from him, Jamie flipped through several pages before landing on the one Mako was just looking at. “What do you think?”

He paused, once again awed by the art and Jamie’s actions. He finally managed to get out, “Why are you showing me this?”

He shrugged lightly, “It’s for you in a sense. I was thinking about how my drawings of you made you fall for me last time, and I thought it’d work again. And if it doesn't, I like drawing you. You’re gorgeous and I have to stare at you long and hard to do it right.”

He paused, at loss for words yet again. After a moment, he spoke, just narrowly avoiding telling him that hood art had nothing to do with his affection. "How come I never noticed you staring at me.”

“I made sure you were focused on something else, or I’d stare at you while we were already talking face to face. Anyway, do you like it?”

“Yeah, they look nice. You have a decent amount of ability. How did you get me to look like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like, better than I look.”

He shrugged again, “It’s probably that infatuation you keep talking about. I’m sure if I truly loved you then you would look different… but this is how you look to me.”

He shook his head lightly, “I don’t think this is a product of infatuation, I mean, I still have flaws in this. But, it still looks a hell of a lot better than it does when I look in the mirror.”

Another shrug, “Maybe because you’re so critical of yourself. You highlight all your negative features. I just draw you the way you are, you gotta stop hating yourself.”

“I don’t hate myself.” 

Jamie twisted around, them re-situated himself so that he wasn’t in Mako’s lap, rather so he was straddling him. “You do hate yourself. And it’s a shame. Remember when you used to wear a face mask to hide your face, and cut your poor little arms?”

“My arms are about as big as your torso, they’re not little.”

He placed a bony finger on his lips, “Shhhhhh. Point is, you’re different now and you aren’t as outward with your internal feelings and shit, But Ican see it in your eyes. Your big, beautiful, brown eyes, that are so full of understanding and stubbornness and hate. You gotta love yourself Mako, love yourself like I love you.”

He pushed away his hand, “This is ridiculous. Why are we focussing on my issues. You’re the one with the most issues here.”

“We can focus on both. You just need to love yourself.”

“And you need to eat and talk about your feelings with others. Who’s worse off here?”

He shook his head, “That doesn’t matter right now. You need to love yourself.”

Mako stood up, letting Jamie fall to the floor as he did. “And you need to stop repeating that. It’s a stupid mantra.”

He stayed on the floor. “If you don't love yourself, then I’ll love you enough for the both of us while you learn to do the same thing.”

He rolled his eyes and continued picking up the room. It had to get done somehow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the word count for this on AO3 tis different than the word count in my fic, cause it wants to split some words and keep others together. so. idk. this is good. 
> 
> I don't know what I'm doing next, so PLEASE, suggest something. Please. PLEASE. I will probably use it then you might feel happy?


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol. My own depression made me write this. I hate life. 
> 
> I as skimming what I already wrote, sort of editing things. And I'm so sorry you had to read my inconsistent, typo riddled writing. If I edit it all this weeend, I'll re-upload chapters. I'm so sorry. 
> 
> Also. This chap has graphic depictions of self harm, and graphic depictions of gore. So. Yeah. Be careful. 
> 
> I edited this;the format on ao3pissed me off. Anyway, I love similes and hate myself.

Ever since that day, Jamie had been pretty damn clingy. He managed to get himself into Mako’s lap on several occasions, despite Mako having something already in his hands or lap and despite his height. He would also link arms or just flat out grab his hand when they were walking together, which was starting to happen quite often.

To be quite honest, Mako didn’t really mind, in fact, he used the clinginess to his advantage. He dragged the boney blond around with him, which made less people talk to him or stare at him with disgust. Apparently having Jamie around either repulsed them more than he did, or just made them overlook him. Either way, it was good for him.

He also got to drag Jamie to the mess hall or to restaurants with him and force him to eat.

In all, Mako didn’t really mind the excessive clinginess from the shorter. It had just become another fact of life; something he was quite used to. Needless to say, it was rather obvious to him when the affection stopped, or rather it should have been.

It had been two hours since he had gotten back from classes, and an hour since Jamie did. They were both in the dorm--Mako rewriting notes and Jamie reading a text book. It took the taller nearly two hours to look up from his note writing at the blond across the room, curled up in his respective bed with a textbook.

He frowned slightly as he grew very aware of the empty space on his lap where the other usually sat. He bit his lip, letting his tongue pass over his new lip ring as he did. Finally, he spoke, “Did I do something to upset you?”

Jamie’s head shot up at the sudden sound of Mako’s voice. It took a second for his pupils to go back down to size after being startled before speaking. He cleared his throat softly as he did, “No, not that I can think of. Why?”

He gave a soft shrug, “You seem more distant that normal.”

He nodded with a small smirk. “You mean I’m not all over you like before. Do you miss it? Does this mean you finally love me back?"

That only got him a roll of the eyes. “You know I like you. But I’m not going to date someone like you. I thought we’ve been over this. You need to make some serious lifestyle changes before I even agree to go on a real date with you”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.” He sighed softly and returned to his book.

Mako gave a soft grunt at that, “Hey, you didn't really answer my question. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong.”

“Don’t bullshit me. I know as well as you do that you only break status quo when you’re upset.”

He shrugged with a small, irritated huff. “I’m fine, okay?”

That still didn’t suffice. “Is this because I won’t date you?”

There was a slight pause in his words. “No, it’s not cause of that.”

“Is it because I fixed your scale so you can’t lie to yourself or your mom?”

“You did what? I thought I Just lost a couple pounds, I gained weight?” A frenzied look entered his eyes as his breathing sped up.

Mako’s frown deepened. “It’s going to be okay. You still look like you usually do. It’s fine. Is that why you're distant?”

His brows furrowed, and his breathing slowed slightly. “No. I’m not being distant, and nothing’s wrong.”

“You are and something is. And how can you say nothing is wrong, you were ready to start hyperventilating just a second ago! There’s something else too. What is it? Just tell me and we won’t have to have this conversation.”

“There really is nothing wrong!” He huffed and closed his text book before shifting his position to be sitting upright on his knees, staring at Mako with those soulful eyes of his. Once he had Mako’s gaze locked with his, he spoke. “I promise, there is nothing wrong with me. You really don’t have to worry. And even if there were something off with my mood or whatever, I really don't think that you’d be able to help. No offence, but you just aren't as tender as you were in high school.”

“I don’t think it’s fair for you to say that. I’ve been plenty kind to you, putting up with your nonsense and all that. I even cradled you in my arms your first night here!”

Jamie began chewing on his chapped lip. “Yeah, all right, I’ll give you that. You have been pretty patient with me and all my antics. Still, I’m not sure you’d be able to help. If something were wrong, that is.”

Before Mako could respond, hi phone started beeping. He sighed and drew the pink clad phone, complete with an old and broken Mr. Bacon, out of his pocket. With a quick swipe of the thumb, he turned the alarm off and stood up. “I have to get to my next class. We’ll talk when I get back, okay?”

Jamie rolled his eyes but nodded gently. “Sure, whatever you want.”

Not saying much else, Mako left the dorm and headed to his next class.

When he got back not fifteen minutes later, there was no one in the darkened dorm. He sighed, figuring Jamie must have left, his fear of confrontation and denial of emotions driving him to leave as soon as he had the chance.

He sighed again and moved to turn on the lights when something caught his eye. Light streamed into the main area from underneath the bathroom door.

With a slight frown dancing on his lips, he moved slowly closer to the door. Once he was close enough, he could hear Jamie’s voice mumbling softly to himself, as he did often, especially when upset.

His frown deepened as he opened the surprisingly unlocked door, letting light flood the room behind him. It only took him one small step into the tiled room to understand what was going on.

Jamie was sitting on the tiled floor, only in his underwear and holding a small hand towel to his upper leg. The edges were stained with blood, probably absorbed from the small cuts leaking crimson around where his hand held the rag in place. Blood also covered the floor, though not the way one would expect. There were fat drops of blood as well as several little ones, but the floor wasn't covered in blood, save for the one spot where the drops got smeared, probably from having been stepped on.

Mako when numb at the sight of Jamie. He honestly looked so frail in this situation, like any word or movement would break him. He stood still, staring with large, frightened eye

With the door now open, and a large shadow looming over his frame, Jamie looked up with a soft smile despite the tears traveling down his thin cheeks. “Oh, hey mate. I thought you’d be in class for another two hours or so.”

“Yeah,” he still spoke despite being frozen to the spot where he stood, “The professor canceled class, so I came back here.”

“Oh, cool. Cool.”

That seemed to break Mako out of his stupor. “No. Not cool! How can we have a casual conversation like this when you’re bleeding and crying?”

“Shit, I’m crying?” He shakily brought his free hand up to his face to wipe away the tears. He only succeeded in transferring some of the blood t his face.

“Jamie, what the hell is going on?” He finally moved forward, kneeling down to speak to him face to face.

The blond looked down and laughed softly, “I don’t know. I really don’t know.” His hand was still on the towel.

Mako frowned but didn’t respond quite yet. Instead, he gently moved the other's bony hand from his leg. What was waiting for him wasn't pretty. A deep gash was there at the top of his left leg. It was deep enough to have probably cut through the second skin. No, it was definitely deep enough. Through the blood that was still flowing heavily, Mako could see muscle, and tiny amounts of fat. In short, it wasn't pretty.

The other started laughing again, only pausing to speak, “It ain’t pretty, is it?” His laughter soon devolved into sobs. “God, I’m so fucking pathetic, aren’t I? Just look at this pitiful display.”

Not knowing what else to do, he sat down and pulled the other to his chest. “What happened?”

He kept crying. “I don’t know.”

“Bull shit, tell me.”

“I can’t.”

He sighed but stopped trying to get information out of him. “You realize we should probably get you to the hospital, right?

He was silent for a moment, “Yeah. And they’re going to realize how fucked up I am.”

“Probably.”

He smiled through his tears, “Wow, nice tact. Not even trying to deny it.”

Mako shrugged. “I’m not in the habit of lying.”

“I thought I was too. Fuck. I promised you I was okay, and look at me. How can I ever be anything other than not okay?”

He shrugged again. “I don't know. Just by trying I guess.” He sighed softly, “I’m going to get some bandages to hold the skin together while we drive.”

“You’re just going to drive me to urgent care on your motorcycle?”

“I don't see any other option. Let’s just hope that you didn’t lose enough blood to pass out, and if you did, you don’t fall off while I'm driving.” He stood up, gently scooting Jamie off his lap as he did so. He sat back down a minute later and started to bandage a lot of the wounds.

Jamie sniffed and looked at him. “Can we not go to urgent care? They take everybody even remotely suicidal and put them in an inpatient ward. I’m not going to get out of there,they’ll just realize how fucked I am. Please, Mako, don’t do it.”  
Another soft sigh escaped his lips. “I don’t know what else to do. You need stitches, and I don’t know how to give you them. What else are we going to do?”

“I don’t know. Call my mom? She has stuff for stitches.”

“She’s a while away. Do you really think she can make it here before you seriously hurt yourself? And if she does, she’ll see everything you’ve become.”

“Yeah, right. I have been hiding a lot from her....” He paused a moment, letting his tears clear up while he thought. “Call her please.”

Mako nodded softly and went to find Jamie’s phone. He paid no attention to the blood on his clothes.

He walked back into the bathroom, “Your mom’s on her way. She’ll be here soon.”

Jamie nodded and finished wiping his his face. “Thanks.”

He was silent for a minute before deciding to sit back on the floor with Jamie. Without asking, he pulled the smaller into his lap again, this time with him facing his chest.

Jamie pressed his face into the other’s shoulder. “God, how much did you tell her?”

“All she needed to know.”

“And that included why I can’t go to any sort of clinic?”

“Yeah.”

“Shit. Well, I guess she’s going to learn enough about how much I suck anyway.”

They sat in silence for a minute until Mako worked up to responding. “You know, you were the one who convinced me to stop cutting, what with your speech about how the world hurts you already, so you don’t need to add to the pain. What happened?”

He shrugged softly, the tears coming back. “I don’t know. I guess I realized that I was on the side of the world that was hurting people. Fuck man, I was the one who hurt you. And I’ve been hurting everyone. I’m just so goddamn awful.”

He was silent for a moment. “You’re not that bad.”

He shrugged. “Still, I’m sorry. I’m really fucking sorry. I’m sorry for luring you into my life, then leaving yours, then sucking you back into this bullshit. I’m sorry for my antics and being high strung and emotional and paranoid and narcissistic and self deprecating and manic and depressed and everything. I’m so sorry Mako, I’m so sorry I’m makin you deal with me.”

Mako sighed softly. “I’m sorry you feel so badly about yourself.”

That just sent him into another round of tears. The taller wrapped his arms around the other’s small torso. They stayed like that, just curled around one another for an hour.

The only thing that broke them apart was Angela, who let herself into the dorm via unlocked door.

Her hair was in a messy pony tail and a large first aid kit was clenched in her fist.

“Mako, dear, I’m going to have you leave us alone for a bit while I dress all the wounds.” She set the first aid kit down and put on latex gloves, after washing her hands of course.

He nodded and left the bathroom, leaving Jamie to be scolded or fawned over, or whatever lay in store for him.

Surprisingly, Mako heard nothing from the bathroom once he left, other than the occasional soft sob.

Nearly half an hour later, Angela walked into the main room as the shower started running, an indication that Jamie wouldn’t be joining them anytime soon. “I tried cleaning up the blood, and I think I got most of it out, but that hand towel is stained for good.”

Mako nodded dumbly.

She took his silence as a cue to continue. She did just that, starting with a heavy sigh. “I do trust Jamie, you know that, right? I really do want to trust him despite all this, and I do. Everything considered, he’s doing a really good job of taking care of himself on his own. Yes, I suspect he’s been drinking and smoking weed behind my back, even maybe having intercourse, but I still trust him. And it’s been fine for the most part. Yes, he’s slightly underweight, but he’s never had a breakdown. If he has, they haven’t been of this alibre. I’ve never had to been called by someone else, or even by him. What happened Mako?”

All he could do was repeat what Jamie had said not too long ago. “I don’t know. I honestly don’t know.”

She sighed gently before smiling in the same manner. “I understand. I’m going to have him come home for the rest of the week. I just want him to get better, and maybe we can figure out what triggered this, if there was a trigger.”

He nodded softly, noticing at that moment that everything was soft, the actions, the lighting, and definitely Angela’s surprisingly calm voice. Perhaps the softness was to show the gravity of the situation and how much it stunned people into an eerie calmness. Perhaps it was just because someone didn’t know any more adjectives. Regardless, things were soft.

Mako inhaled shakily then exhaled in an attempt to come to his senses. He looked to Angela, “Ma’am, I really hope I’m not what caused this. But if I am, I respect both your and Jamie’s decision to not come back here. Just, tell him that I love him for me, okay?”

He grabbed his keys and left the dorm, leaving just the two blonds together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What do you mean I'm projecting my feelings and experiences onto characters? How dare.
> 
> I think j know what I want to write next. I realised my issue with not writing as much as I want is due to lack of emotion and angst. You need to be over the top bro. 
> 
> Still. I will take suggestions. Please. What do you want me to do? I'll do it cause I need ideas and I'm desperate to e liked.


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hells yeah I'm back. but only for five more days. Let's see how much I can write across all my stories whilst baking and maintaining my intern ship. 
> 
> This did not really turn out like I wanted, I wanted Jamie to feel like he was in a fish-bowl, able to see the world and not be able to interact with it. Which is how I feel constantly! But no, he's just sad. IDK why, I forget everything. 
> 
> Anyway, enjoy. Hopefully this BS is winding down and I only have a few more chapters....

When Jamie got out of the shower and walked back to the main dorm room, he noticed two things. One, Mako was gone. Two, Angela was standing there with a packed bag for him. 

He frowned slightly as he stepped forward, still only in underwear. In his defence he didn’t have other clothes when he went into the bathroom, and he still didn’t have any clothes! At least he was going to go get something on. 

As he was putting on sweatpants, he looks to his adoptive mother, a question clearly on the tip of his tongue. “Where did Mako go?”

She shrugged, “He left. I don't know where he went or really why, but he did have a message for me to pass on to you.”

He looked up, his brows slightly raise,d “Oh yeah? What did he say?”

She sighed softly, “That he loves you and wants you to be okay. But I don't think you should get fixated on his words quite yet, considering we still have to talk.”

He nodded, but despite his best efforts, he was already obsessing over that simple message.

Luckily, Angela pulled him out of it. “All right. Let’s get going. You’ll be coming home for the rest of the week.”

“Yeah, okay.” he wasn’t going to fight her like he normally would. She probably knew best at that point. So, he followed her to her car and got into the passenger’s seat, immediately curling in on himself. 

They drove in silence for awhile, until Jamie spoke up. “Are you going to scold me for the tattoo or how skinny I am or hurting myself?”

She sighed softly, “No. I don't think so. I don’t see a point in it right now; you seem to know it’s wrong. I think that your dad might get on your case for the tattoo and making me worry.”

“Yeah…” He trailed off again only to speak moments later. “I’m sorry Angela. I didn’t mean to make you worry.”

“Then why did you do it? Any of this?”

He shrugged, not that she could see considering she was looking at the road like a good driver. That, or a driver who wanted to avoid looking at her broken son and not cry.

“I didn’t want you to worry, but I couldn’t really help myself. Or, I could but I told myself I couldn’t because I could get away with it. I don’t know, it’s just kinda a fucked up situation.”

“Mind your language please.” Her voice was still quiet. 

“Sorry.”

They fell into a silence again. It lasted almost twenty minutes before Angela spoke, a soft quiver in her voice this time. “Jamie. You know that I want to help you right? I might scold you from time to time, but I really do want to help. I want you to not only know you can come to me for anything at any time, but I want you to actually do that. Understand?”

He rested his chin on his knees, “Yeah. Sorry I don’t.”

“Honey, you don’t have to be apologetic any more. I know you’re remorseful.”

Another silence almost took over again, but Angela fought it off. “You seemed fine for your first two years of college. You’ve never done anything like get a tattoo or weird piercings or anything like this. I have to ask, is there a trigger? Did something happen to make you fall into bad habits?”

He sighed, “There isn’t always a trigger mom, sometimes you just feel like shit.”

She pressed her mouth into a thin line. “Well okay then, just try to take it easy once we get home.”

The rest of the ride was in silence. Even as the radio played the coolest hits from the eighties, it couldn’t over power the silence that hung in the car. 

As soon as he got home, he went to go lie down in his room. 

Nobody bothered him for almost two days. Sure Angela brought him food and checked on him, but no one really made him leave his room, not even Hana. 

Halfway through the second day he had been home, Amelia burst through the door, followed closely by Gabe. “Jamie! I haven’t seen you in so long!” She plopped herself at the foot of the bed as if she had been invited to.

Jamie squinted at her, “Amelia? What the hell.”

“Yes, it is me, who else could it be? Well, I mean Gabe. Anyway, I heard you were having a rough time and I came to see you. Last time you locked yourself in your room, you refused to see us. Well, Mako isn't here and you can't play favorites.” 

He furrowed his brow, “I can still refuse to see you.” 

“I mean, you can, but I don't think I'll let you. Lack of socialization makes you worse.” 

“Does this mean that Gabe is coming too.” 

She smiled, “Of course, we're the dynamic duo.” 

“Still? That's impressive.” 

She nodded, “It has been rough though. What with Lena’s doctor appointments, college and Gabe’s new friend.” 

His brows only knit closer together, “Okay, I get the college part, but what does the rest of that mean?” 

“Oh right. You haven't been here. Okay, well Lena’s heart problems are coming back, we don't know why. She has a lot of doctors appointments and I go with her for support. Then Gabe’s--” 

She was cut off. “wait, what do you mean again? I don't remember her ever having heart problems. She was totally fine the last time I saw her.” 

“She had them when we were young, but she it better from halfway through middle school then through high school. I guess it just wasn't enough.” Amelia sighed, her face getting a bit concerned before die snapped back to cheerful. Or rather as cheerful as someone can be. “But Gabe's friend. She moved her from Mexico. She's a bit younger than us and she already has a paying job. Don't have to go to college, it's ludicrous.” 

Jamie nodded, “Sounds fun.” A silence feels over the room. 

Just as Amelia opened her mouth to speak, Gabriel walked into the room, swinging the door open with a bang as he did. “What up fucks, I got crinkly fries.” He moved fully into the room and sat down on the bed like Amelia had done minutes before. 

He offered the cup of fries to other who just shook his head. 

Gabe shrugged and ate one before speaking, ‘Suit yourself. Anyway, I heard you’re having a rough time. What’s up?”

Wow, he had gotten a lot more cheerful and not as grumpy than the last time he appeared, 

Jamie scowled at the two sitting just feet away from him. At least they let him have his space. Still, he scowled. “How the hell do both of you know that I’m going through a rough patch?”

Amelia spoke up, “Oh you know, Amelia took up working at the hospital part time, and I saw her when I took Lena in. She told me all about it. At least she remembered we were friends.”

Jamie was silent for a long moment, “Sorry. I just assumed when I left, I severed ties with you since I severed ties with Mako. I mean, he really was the only thing tying me to anything social.”

“He might have introduced us to you, but by no means is he the only thing keeping us friends, I mean, we bonded. And we had interests that weren’t just Mako. Like graffiti, you still do that, don’t you?”

He shrugged his thin shoulders, “Not really. I’m too busy. Do you?”

“No, I took up regular painting. Graffiti is a young man’s game.”

Jamie nodded, letting a silence fall over them. 

Gabe was the one to break it. “Wow, this is awkward, Look, just because we have all changed interests and had different experiences in the past doesn’t mean that e can’t be friends. We had a connection back then, granted the connection isn’t the same.” Perhaps he was high, or just a plot device…

The blond turned his head to stare vacantly at the tidy room. “I don’t know. Do you ever think that people become friends just because it’s a small town and we’re all desperate to be social. So one similar interest links us together, then we develop similar views because we spend so much time together?”

The frown that he wore seemed to transfer to Amelia’s face. “What are you saying?”

He shrugged, “Unless you believe in predestination, we meet just by chance and force a relationship or friendship so we don’t have to be lonely.”

“And what if we do believe in predestination.”

“Then we were fated to meet each other and be friends for a period of time. Nothing we do really matters then, and no matter what we do, and no matter how hard we try to keep people together, it just won’t work. Ever. Because we’re all just destined to fall away.”

Still frowning, Amelia moved so that she was sitting next to Jamie, an arm wrapped around his shoulders. “That’s pretty damn depressing, I must admit. But I don’t think any of it is true.”

“You can’t prove it’s not.”

“No, But I can advise you to not look so deep into the abyss of despair. You can't focus on the bad things in life, no matter how true they are. No one needs to focus on negativity.”

“Yeah? Well, I think I just need to be alone, and sort out some shit.”

Gabe snorted, “If Mako was here, you wouldn’t be saying that.” He moved so he was sitting on the other side of Jamie, half on the bed and half off, seeing as it wasn’t the widest bed in the world. 

“If Mako were here, he’d let me be alone. Things have been rocky with us since we met again. You know, with the whole me breaking his heart kind of thing?”

Gabe scoffed again, “Who the hell cares.You’re entire life seems to revolve around him. It’s great and all if you love each other, or if one of you does and the other doesn’t, or if none of you love each other. You’re just as hung up about him as he is you, I think you both need to grow the fuck up and move on.”

Amelia reached across Jamie to smack Gabe’s arm. “Be sensitive. Besides, it really sounds like once you go back to college, you’ll have a lovely, rekindled romance with Mako. So, don’t be so dismal.”

He turned to stare at Amelia, confusion written plainly all over his face. “What the hell do you mean by that?”

She tilted her head, letting her dark hair spill over her shoulder, “Didn’t you get the message? Mako said he told your mom to tell you…” She cut herself off. “Knowing Angela….” Again, she cut herself off. Her sentences were really starting to sound like her inner thoughts, half put together and fleeting.

After a moment she looked at Jamie, smiling. “Anyway, I think you should call Mako and talk to him about this yourself. I think Gabe and I will leave now so you can have some privacy.”

She stood up off the bed, crossed it, and grabbed Gabe’s hand. 

“What? No, I ain’t going yet. I only just got here and it’s been three years. What the hell Amelia?”

She kept tugging him until she pulled him out of the room, him losing several of his precious crinkly cut fries as they left. 

Jamie was left on his bed staring at the door. After a bit, he shifted his gaze to stare at his phone which was conveniently sitting on the nightstand next to the bed. His gaze bore into it, as if willing it to ring on it’s own or dial Mako without him actually having to do anything like make a choice to contact the man he had complicated feelings towards. 

Nothing happened, as one could guess. 

With a sigh, he once again realigned his gaze to fall on the door. 

Silence overtook the room once again. That is, until his phone rang.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy the cliff hanger? LOL. Me too. I bet the person who is calling him is actually some spam company. 
> 
> Anyway, I have to go check on my pies and eat the lasagne in the fridge....
> 
> But please leave comments. I am so desperate for attention.


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this took sooo fucking long to write. I don't know why. but, merry Christmas. this is done. happy ending for once 
> 
> to my regular readers/people who followed this for a while: thank you so much for reading this and leaving all of your wonderful comments. 
> 
> to the binge readers: you can have this fic now. No one else will read it, and now that this is done, you will want to read it. also, i really love comments as they give me validation, so no matter how old this is, please comment.
> 
> edit:holy shit. I noticed that this was at 44999 words. So I edited it to split up a word and bam. and even 45000. Nice.

A rather annoying pop song overtook the silence that originally surrounded his room. With eager eyes, Jamie picked up the device to look at the screen to see who exactly was calling. No one. 

Well, that wasn’t exactly accurate. Someone was calling, why else would the phone be ringing. But it wasn’t a saved number, which meant it was a telemarketer. He sighed and ignored the call. 

Wow. How naive was he to actually think and hope that it was Mako calling? This wasn’t a storybook fairytale where everyone got married and didn’t have emotional breakdowns and just be really messed up in general. 

Jamie sighed and rolled onto his side, pointedly ignoring his phone once again. 

His phone continued to ring through out the next couple of days. It seemed that every telemarketer in the area finally got to his number. He just kept ignoring the unknown numbers. 

These unwarranted calls, were not the only irritating part of his life. Everyday after dinner, Angela would walk in and try to talk to him. Of course, he didn’t, not until she brought Jack in as backup. 

They sat on either side of him on the bed. Angela reached over and placed a slender hand on his knee. “Jamie, I think you know what I’m going to ask. Will you please open up to us this time? I’m getting tired of going through this charade and repeating the same practised conversation. I’m sure you are too.”

Jamie groaned in response and threw himself back across the bed. Of course, he was too long to do that, so his legs hung off of one side as his head dangled on the other. “I’m just tired period.”

Jack sighed audibly, “We can let you get some sleep as soon as you have a meaningful conversation with us about your mental well being.”

“No, I’m tired like that. I’m tired of life, and repetition and nothing going perfectly, and just everything.”

“I’m sorry to hear that honey,” She gave his knee a little pat, “Do you know why you’re feeling like this suddenly?”

Another sigh came from Jamie’s lips. “Probably because I don’t leave the house. The same scene day in and day out is depressing and killing my spirit. And the fact that I know that I’m missing my classes. I want to actually do something, school work, or just work. I’m tired of this life.”

“Why?” Of course it was Jack to ask the question that was constantly directed at him. 

“I don't know. I know you want me to give you a definite answer, but I can’t. I know you want to help, but you can’t. The best you can do is let me live my life, figure out what works for me, and offer help if the need arises.”

“That won’t work for me.” Another pat, this one firmer. 

Jamie dug the heels of his hands into his eyes, “I’m sorry.” 

A small pause took over, as was common in these conversations. This time, though, Jamie was the one to fill it, not Angela, and definitely not Jack. “If I can tell you why I tried to saw off my leg the other day, will you let me at least go outside?”

“You can go outside any time you want, it’s not like we’re keeping you captive.”

 

“No, but it sort of feels like that. Every time I leave my room, I’m just attacked with pitying looks or soft voices trying to lure me into a conversation, and everyone acts like I’m some wild animal that will leave if I see any sudden movement. That’s why I stay in my room. That and sometimes I can see you Angela, just sitting, looking so tired and sad, and I know it’s because of me. I just want to go outside without hurting anyone or getting pity. This is just like the fucking amputation shit all over again, except I’m not helpless this time.”

Silence filled the space around the three of them again. 

Finally, after what seemed like at least five minutes, Jack spoke, “No one said you were helpless.”

Jamie sighed heavily and propped himself up with his elbows, having to drag his head from the side of the bed as he did so. “I know. But that’s what I feel you think of me.” He was quiet for just a moment. “I guess I’m not asking for permission to go outside, I’m asking for you guys to stop acting like I’ll break at a moment’s notice. I want you guys to go back to normal, I mean, I already have.”

“I guess it’s just hard for people to see you hurt and not being able to do anything. And we don’t even know when you’re hurting, because there’s no physical mark. We just want to help, but we don’t know how or when you need it.”

“I’ll tell you if I need anything from you. All you need to do is be there.”

“You’ll have to forgive me, but I don’t know if I believe you when you say you’ll come to us for help.”

Jamie glared at Jack, “I will. Or I’ll try. I don’t know what else I can promise.”

“You can promise to tell us what makes you want to hurt yourself so that we can help you avoid them,” Angela suggested, helpful as ever. 

“Fine. If I tell you why I hurt myself the other night, can you go back to normal and will this conversation and any others like it in the near future be over?”

“Sure.”

Another sigh passed his lips, this time to steady his nerves bot as a sign of annoyance. “Like I already said fifty million times, I don’t know. But I can give you my best guess why I relapsed so hard. Probably because I need constant validation. I want it from people I actively care about. I didn’t care to know most people in college, and the people I did know, Jesse and you guys, did love me and give me validation. Then Mako appeared, and everything went downhill. 

“He might have loved me, but he wouldn’t like, give me the love unless I was what he wanted me to be. But like, he didn’t say that explicitly or anything, and I’m sure he didn’t mean to hurt me.” He gave a soft shrug, “I don’t know. His actions made me hate myself for who I was. But you know, I can handle that. I pushed those thoughts away and I continued to live my life. He refused to acknowledge or return affection though, and I got really paranoid and yeah.”

Angela sighed, “I knew it had something to do with him. He’s a sweet boy, but your entire life revolves around him. You won’t be able to control him, and he’ll just control you that way.”

He rolled his eyes, “It’s not his fault mom. He’s fine, I just need to change my world view. You know, Gabe said the exact same thing the other day, I don't see how it’s true. I have passions and ambitions that have nothing to do with him.”

“You just think so highly of him.” She stood up off of the bed, “Thank you for opening up. I’ll try to act more normal now.”

He nodded, “And get some sleep too.”

She gave him a soft smile and took Jack’s hand to lead him off. 

Jamie turned himself so that he could lie down without all the blood in his body rushing to his head. As soon as he got comfortable, his phone rang. 

Irritated, he began to search for his phone; he had started leaving it odd places since the calls from telemarketers. And to be frank, he was more than willing to continue ignoring the calls, but he wanted to blow off steam by messing with a robot or someone not paid enough to care what he said. 

Finally he found his phone, half charged and under his mattress. He clicked the answer button as he laid back down on the bed. “Hello?”

“Fucking finally!” It was Mako. “I’ve been calling you for days. Did your parents take your phone or something?”

“No…. I thought you were a telemarketer…”

A brief paused preceded Mako’s response. “You don’t have my number saved?”

“Maybe not? I haven't really needed to call or text you since like, Junior year of high school….”

He huffed on the other side of the call, “I kept yours.”

“I noticed.” A silence threatened, as they often do in pieces of literature such as this one. “I’m glad you did, I kind of wanted to talk to you…”

“Good. I, uh, wanted to talk to you too about something.”

A smile made its way onto Jamie’s face, “Really? I had no idea.”

“Shut up. What did you want to talk about?”

“It can wait till later. You called, so you get to speak first.”

“Are you sure? This could end up like a movie, where I say you were right and I needed to find love but you were about to say that you love me deeply and now you can’t because it will be awkward.”

“Well, it is true that I love you, I don’t think that will happen. I’m known to say what I want even if it is awkward, and we both know my infatuation with you. So go ahead.”

“Good point. Well, I just wanted to make sure you got my message. Or that’s why I called you the first day. You hadn’t called or texted, I guess I know why now, but at the time I was worried. Then Amelia and i started talking. She mentioned how the message hadn’t been passed to you and asked if you had called. You hadn’t. So. Here I am now, ready to relay the message to you.”

The smile on his face only grew bigger, “Well, first I want to say that that probably is the longest I’ve heard you talk in a while. Second, ‘The Message’ is such a cryptid name. At least say ‘my message’. Third, no I did not get your message. I would have called, but the whole idea slipped my mind. That’s actually why I’m glad you called, so I can ask about this cryptic message. What do you want to tell me?”

Mako chuckled, “Right, just that I love you.”

The smile quickly fell from his face. “I know that you love me, you just refuse to date me until I become a better person and apologize in earnest. I know, I don’t need a reminder.”

“No, Jamie--” His sentence was cut off by the barrage of words coming from Jamie’s mouth. 

“Oh? So then is this a pity kind of thing? You wanted to make sure I knew that you loved me because that would stop me from cutting myself again?”

“No. Jamie, listen to my sentence all the way before you jump to conclusions.”

He scoffed, “Please, I don’t need to sit here and listen to this.” He honestly had no idea why he was getting so angry. Maybe it was the idea of unneeded, and frankly unwanted pity. 

“Jamie.” His voice grew gruff and raised in volume. 

It wasn’t visible to the other, but he flinched. “What?” Despite the fear now seeping into him, he managed to make the remark snappish.

“I need you to listen to me. I love you unconditionally. Seeing you like that made my heart pound because I was so afraid for you, or that I might never see you again. I love you even though you’re kind of an ass who never listens.”

“I don’t see how that’s much different than how you felt about me later.”

“Me neither… but it really seemed like I should tell you.” He sighed heavily, “I don’t want to talk to you over phone, it’s awkward. Can I come get you? I’m in town for the weekend.”

He chewed his lip thoughtfully, “Fine. But you’re taking me to the park.”

“The park? Why?”

“I’m really tired of being inside.”

“Okay, I’ll be there in a few. Bye.”

“Yeah, bye.” He hung up the phone and made his way downstairs. 

Jack looked up as soon as he made it to the landing. “Going somewhere?”

“Yeah, Mako’s picking me up.”

His mouth pressed into a line, “I don’t know if that's a good idea.”

“You practically said I was free to come and go as I pleased five minutes ago.”

“Yeah, but not with Mako.”

Suddenly filled with teenage sass, he rolled his eyes, “I’m like, twenty, I can handle myself. I’ll be safe and avoid bodily harm.” He stepped outside, effectively cutting off the conversation. 

It wasn’t long after that he was sitting on the back of Mako’s bike, arms wrapped around his waist, ready to take off. 

Mako, however, wasn’t. His foot still on the ground, he looked at the house with the perfect picket fence, “You’re mom’s glaring at me from behind the curtains. What’s that about?”

He shrugged, “I might have told you that you were the reason that I cut myself.”

“I am?” 

“No, course you aren’t. It was a combination of my fucked up world view, paranoia, perception of you, and self hatred.”

“So I contributed?”

“No, you big lug.” He reached up and pat his cheek, “It’s all on me. Let’s go to the park before she comes out here and tells me to go back to my room. I’m so tired of that place.”

He nodded once before lifting his foot off the ground and driving away. 

At the ark, they walked side by side in silence until they reached a bench. Jamie was the first to sit down. 

Mako raised a brow, “You're not going to go play on the swings or something”

“Nah, I promised my folks I’d avoid bodily harm. Anyway, we’re supposed to talk or some shit.”

“Yeah but I figured I could wait until you blew off steam and ran out of energy.’

Jamie shook his head, “I’m fine. Just being outside is a huge relief.”

Mako shrugged and sat next to him on the bench. “Well, I can’t really think of a nice way to get into this, so I’ll just start talking.” He took a soft breath in, “Well. We can’t ignore the past, but we shouldn’t dwell on it. Everything we have done in our lives has lead us here and now we don’t know how to progress, or at least I don’t. I can’t plan for the future, and I can’t ignore the past, and I can’t suppress whatever emotions I feel currently. I say we throw all traditional shit to the wind and do what we want. I’m not sure how else to go about it, setting down rules doesn’t work and pretending nothing is there doesn’t work. So let’s just do whatever.”

Jamie sighed softly and leaned his head against the other's large bicep. “Sounds like a good plan. One problem, it sounds like a really shitty romance book ending. Where nontraditional spontaneous love wins.”

He shrugged, “Than that will just have to be the case. Besides, it might just be for now. We’ll either breakup, get into a more monogamous stable relationship, or get drunk in vegas and marry each other or some shit. Everything in life is temporary.”

“Well ain’t you a big ol’ bucket of sunshine. What happened to the Mako who fell in love with the skinny kid down the street because he bought him a guinea pig and thought they were going to stay together forever?”

Frowning, Mako bumped him with his elbow, “Shut up. What do you think about this?”

He grinned, “I think I want to kiss you.”

With a snort, he smirked and rolled his eyes, but he did lean over to kiss him. 

They’re hands found each other as they broke the kiss, each of them smiling. 

Yes, this would work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please tell me if I left anything unresolved/undone. and leave a comment please!
> 
> well guys, this was a journey. the first time i wrote something more than fifteen chapters. can't believe I was updating once or twice a day before. now all i want to do in my spare time (which is none) is die and play pokemon. i may never get this far in anything again.
> 
> edit:how many of y'all want me to continue writing for thsi ship? I have like, one idea, and it's not great. So if y'all wanna suggest things, feel free. idk.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah. If you're confused. Read the first notes. Or leave a comment. I have so much to say. Please ask me about this, or just tell me you sort of liked it.


End file.
